Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 12.2
The main biomes of the world. (Source: United Nations Environmental Program (GRID-
Arendal UNEP), http://www.grida.no/graphicslib/detail/the-main-biomes-of-the-world_f8c1 Vital
Forest Graphics, 2009. Rekacewicz et al.
2009
)
•
Tropical rain forest
-in middle America and Gulf of Mexico, Venezuela, West Af-
rica, South East Asia, far northern Australia. Ferns with high rainfall (2,000 mm)
requirements throughout the year include Amazon basin of South America, the
Congo basin of central Africa, Indonesia, and New Guinea.
•
Subtropical moist deciduous forest
-with less than 2,000 mm of rainfall in South
America, in Central America and around the Caribbean, in coastal West Africa,
parts of the Indian subcontinent, and across much of Indochina.
•
Cool temperate forest
coniferous trees (pines, firs and cedars) or mostly decidu-
ous broad (thin) leaved evergreens that shed leaves in winter or examples of
olive, holly, tea and eucalyptus) which have thick leaves resistant to water loss
with rainfall over 1,400 mm in North Europe South America, South Africa, Eu-
rope, Asia (Iran, Taiwan, Japan) and Australia (Victoria and Tasmania).
•
Warm temperate forest
-Mediterranean woodlands and scrubland, a climate
characterised by wet winters and dry summers, trees that have some xerophytic
characters but where winters are not severe and plants are evergreen. These oc-
cur in the Mediterranean basin, Chilean Matorral, Californian chaparral, Cape
Province, Southwest Australia with a high diversity of plant species dominated
by broadleaf trees (oak woodland) and evergreen sclerophyll forests and shru-
bland including fynbos in South Africa and kwongan in Southwest Australia.
•
Deserts
-in New Mexico, Sahara (North Africa), Gobi (Mongolia and China),
Kalahari (Angola), Patagonian (Argentina and Chile), Great Victoria, Great
