The Adelie Land tundra is a tundra ecoregion in the Antarctica biogeographic realm, covering roughly 68 square miles (RESOLVE 2017 ecoregion 117). Under the Dinerstein "Nature Needs Half" framework it is classed Half Protected (tier 1 of 4) — at least half of its natural habitat already lies within protected areas. CHELSA climate coverage isn't available at this ecoregion's centroid, so no hardiness snapshot is shown here.

The Admiralty Islands lowland rain forests cover the volcanic Admiralty Islands of Papua New Guinea, which make up Manus Province in the country's Islands Region, an isolated archipelago lying roughly 280 kilometers off the northern coast of New Guinea. Lowland tropical rainforest dominates the larger islands, with characteristic canopy trees including Calophyllum, Barringtonia, and Terminalia, fringed by coastal shrub zones of Sararanga and Pandanus. The climate is warm and wet year-round, with daytime highs near 30 to 32 degrees Celsius, cooler nights, and about 3,400 millimeters of annual rainfall that peaks during the June-to-August wet season. Long isolation from any landmass has produced notable endemism, including several endemic birds such as the superb pitta and Manus fantail, the Admiralty flying-fox, and the emerald green snail, the first land snail listed as vulnerable by the IUCN. Commercial logging and forest conversion now place heavy pressure on the remaining forests, especially in the interior of Manus Island.

The Aegean and Western Turkey sclerophyllous and mixed forests ring the Aegean Sea, spanning most of mainland Greece and the Aegean islands, the western coast of Turkey, and reaching into southeastern North Macedonia and southwestern Bulgaria. Its vegetation is classic Mediterranean: dense maquis shrubland of holm oak, strawberry tree, and bay laurel, extensive pine forests of Calabrian (Turkish) pine, Aleppo pine, and stone pine, with sweet chestnut and oriental beech on cooler northern slopes. The climate is Mediterranean, with mild winters and dry summers. The ecoregion's flagship is the oriental sweetgum (Liquidambar orientalis), endemic to a limited area of southwestern Turkey and the Greek island of Rhodes, and much of the original habitat has been heavily degraded by human activity dating back to ancient times. For gardeners drawn to drought-tolerant Mediterranean planting, native genera such as Arbutus (strawberry tree), Laurus (bay laurel), and the pines offer ornamental, climate-suited choices.

The Afghan Mountains semi-desert covers three disconnected interior valleys on the northern slope of Afghanistan's central mountains, the Koh-i-Baba range and the wider Hindu Kush, reaching from the Hari River valley near Chaghcharan through the Bamyan Valley to Badakhshan Province in the east. These high, dry valleys carry an open cover of thorny shrubs and small trees generally under 1.5 metres tall, with wild almond and pistachio among the characteristic woody plants. The climate is arid and strongly continental, with large seasonal temperature swings and warm summers, and the ground is roughly two-thirds herbaceous cover and one-third bare. Several threatened animals persist here, including the endangered Kashmir musk deer, which serves as the region's flagship species, and the Persian leopard, though overgrazing by livestock presses on the vegetation and the wildlife that depends on it. The ecoregion overlaps Band-e Amir National Park, Afghanistan's first national park and an IUCN-recognized protected area. For gardeners in dry continental climates, the region's native wild almond (Prunus) and pistachio (Pistacia) are familiar drought-adapted genera.

The Ahklun and Kilbuck Upland Tundra ecoregion spans the rugged Ahklun and Kilbuck mountain ranges of southwestern Alaska, bounded by the Bering Sea and its bays. Steep, sharp mountains—glaciated during the Pleistocene, with only a few small glaciers remaining—are separated by broad, flat valleys. Vegetation is largely moist and alpine tundra and dwarf scrub thickets dominated by heath-family plants, dwarf Arctic birch, and mountain avens; trees such as white and black spruce, paper birch, and balsam poplar are confined to valley floors and lower slopes. The climate mixes maritime and continental influences, with annual precipitation ranging from about 1,020 mm in lowlands to 2,030 mm in the high mountains. It is among the most pristine ecoregions on the continent, with 99% of habitat intact, much of it within the Togiak National Wildlife Refuge.

The Al-Hajar foothill xeric woodlands and shrublands wrap around the lower flanks of Arabia's Hajar Mountains, spanning Oman and the United Arab Emirates from Jalan Bani Buhassan in southern Oman north to Khasab and the area south of the Musandam peninsula. Below the cooler montane belt, this is a hot, hyper-arid country of rocky slopes and gravel plains, where Acacia tortilis is the dominant tree and the Al Saleel area holds one of the largest tracts of Acacia in Arabia. Wadis that hold a little more moisture support ghaf, wild almond, Wonderboom fig, and Christ's thorn jujube. Despite the harsh conditions the ecoregion carries a high proportion of rare and endemic species and remains a stronghold for the Arabian tahr, its flagship animal, alongside Arabian gazelle, caracal, and Blanford's fox. For gardeners in similar dry climates, its drought-hardy natives such as Acacia and jujube point to plants suited to heat and scarce rainfall.

The Al-Hajar montane woodlands and shrublands cover the highest reaches of the Hajar Mountains in eastern Arabia, spanning portions of northern Oman and the United Arab Emirates above roughly 1,200 metres, including the summit area around Jebel Shams. Vegetation shifts with elevation: olive and Sideroxylon (Monotheca) woodlands occupy the lower montane belt, while open woodlands of Zeravschan juniper (Juniperus seravschanica) characterize the high peaks, often mixed with wild olive and watered by acacias and figs along seasonal watercourses. Despite being wetter than the surrounding foothills, it remains a mountain desert with low annual rainfall, hot summers, and cool winters that bring occasional rain, hail, and snow to the highest ground. The juniper woodlands are a botanical stronghold, holding a large share of Oman's total flora along with a number of endemic plant taxa, and the range shelters the endemic Arabian tahr (Arabitragus jayakari) plus several endemic lizards; overgrazing by goats and camels and climate-driven juniper decline are leading conservation concerns. For gardeners, the native flora here illustrates how junipers and olives can anchor a drought-tolerant, cold-snap-resilient mountain planting.

The Alai–Western Tian Shan steppe stretches across the lowland and loess plains at the western foot of the Tien Shan and Alay mountains in Central Asia, spanning parts of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan. It belongs to the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome, where ephemeroid herb and grass vegetation dominates alongside coniferous Juniperus woodlands and relict fruit and nut forests; characteristic steppe plants include bulbous meadow-grass (Poa bulbosa), sedges (Carex), wormwoods (Artemisia), and wild ryes (Elymus). The climate is sharply continental, with hot, dry summers, mild winters, a wide annual temperature swing, and only modest precipitation. The region is botanically rich, with more than 2,000 recorded plant species, and it serves as a recognized centre of crop diversity holding important wild relatives of cultivated plants; the critically endangered Saiga antelope is its flagship animal. For gardeners, the area's native junipers and its wealth of wild fruit and nut relatives reflect a flora long tied to cultivation.

The Alashan Plateau semi-desert straddles the China–Mongolia border, sitting between the Tibetan Plateau to the south and the more arid regions of the Gobi Desert to the north and east, of which it intercepts a large portion. Its basin-and-range landscape carries sparse, drought-adapted vegetation, where salt-tolerant halophytes and xerophytes such as saxaul (Haloxylon ammodendron) and Reaumuria soongorica stabilize the soil, alongside wormwoods (Artemisia) and bean caper (Zygophyllum), with desert poplar (Populus euphratica) and Tamarix along watercourses like the Yellow River. The climate is cold and very arid, with frost and snow on the dunes and very low annual precipitation (around 95 mm/year). The region shelters notable wildlife including the wild Bactrian camel, snow leopard, and Saker falcon, and the black stork serves as its flagship species, though protection remains limited amid threats from illegal mining and overgrazing. For gardeners in cold dry climates, its hardy native genera such as saxaul, Reaumuria, and Artemisia point to plants tolerant of harsh, low-water conditions.

The Alaska Peninsula montane taiga stretches along the rugged Alaska Peninsula from Cook Inlet to Unimak Island, taking in roughly 80% of Kodiak Island and many smaller islands. Despite the "taiga" label, much of the landscape is treeless scrub: low willow thickets on sheltered slopes, tall green-alder communities at lower elevations, and crowberry-dominated dwarf scrub on exposed uplands, set among rounded ridges and steep volcanic peaks rising to 2,600 m. The maritime climate keeps temperatures moderate while delivering heavy precipitation, from 600-3,300 mm along the coast to over 4,000 mm at higher elevations. The region is famous for the Kodiak brown bear and is well protected, with Katmai National Park and Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge safeguarding salmon streams and seabird habitat.

The Alaska-St. Elias Range tundra spans a broad arc of northern mountains across Alaska, southwestern Yukon, and northwestern British Columbia, encompassing the Alaska Range and Wrangell-St. Elias Range and reaching the summit of Denali, North America's highest peak. Much of the ecoregion is rocky slopes, ice fields, and glaciers; where permanent snow and ice are absent, alpine tundra dominated by dwarf shrub communities, mountain avens, and heath-family shrubs prevails, with willows, alders, and dwarf birch on more protected slopes. The climate is alpine and glacierized North Pacific cordilleran, largely continental except for a maritime influence near Cook Inlet. The hoary marmot is the flagship species, and roughly 45% of the ecoregion is protected.

The Albany Thickets ecoregion lies in South Africa's Eastern Cape, concentrated in the wide valleys of the Great Fish, Sundays, and Gamtoos rivers around the Albany region. It forms a dense, spiny shrubland and woodland with a canopy up to about 2.5 metres tall, growing on well-drained sandy soils and rich in succulents such as the porkbush (Portulacaria afra), jade plant (Crassula ovata), aloes, and succulent Euphorbia, alongside trees like Schotia afra. The climate is dry, hot in summer and cold in winter, with inland valleys swinging from near 0 degrees C to over 40 degrees C and receiving low, irregular rainfall. The thickets form part of the Cape Floristic Region and are a noted center of endemism for succulent Euphorbia, while Addo Elephant National Park protects African bush elephants and black rhinoceros within the region. For gardeners, the spekboom (Portulacaria afra) and jade plant native here are both widely grown ornamental, drought-tolerant succulents.

The Alberta-British Columbia foothills forests form a transitional temperate conifer ecoregion straddling the boundary between the Rocky Mountains to the west and the Mid-Canada boreal plains to the east, lying mostly in Alberta with a portion in British Columbia. Mixed forests of lodgepole pine, quaking aspen, jack pine, and white spruce dominate, with balsam poplar, paper birch, and balsam fir also common, while wetter sites support black spruce and tamarack. The climate is subhumid and cold temperate, with short summers averaging 13-15C, cold winters from -17.5 to -10C, and annual precipitation of roughly 400-600 mm. Heavily altered by agriculture, logging, and oil and gas development, only about 1% of the ecoregion holds protected status.

The Albertine Rift montane forests cloak the mountains of the western branch of the East African Rift, spanning five countries: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Tanzania, and taking in ranges such as the Virunga and Rwenzori mountains and isolated massifs near Lake Tanganyika. These tropical moist broadleaf forests are rich in the plant families Euphorbiaceae, Rubiaceae, and Meliaceae, with vegetation shifting by elevation from dense lowland forest through moss- and fern-draped montane forest into giant bamboo and high moorland. Although it sits in the heart of tropical Africa, the high terrain gives the region an essentially temperate climate, with annual rainfall generally between 1,200 and 2,200 millimeters and reaching about 3,000 millimeters on the western slopes of the Rwenzori. The ecoregion holds the highest faunal endemism in Africa and is the only home of the mountain gorilla, earning it a place on the Global 200 list of priority conservation areas, with strongholds protected in parks including Virunga, Volcanoes, Bwindi Impenetrable, Nyungwe, and Kahuzi-Biega. Gardeners may recognize the giant montane bamboo that forms a distinct belt across these slopes.

The Aldabra Island xeric scrub covers the coral atoll of Aldabra in the Seychelles, an isolated landform in the western Indian Ocean lying roughly 400 km northwest of Madagascar. Its xeric vegetation falls into two main types: dense thickets of Pemphis acidula on the saline, low-lying ground, and a mixed scrub of low trees, shrubs, herbs, and grasses spread across most of the atoll. The climate is tropical, with an average annual temperature near 27 degrees Celsius and about 1,200 mm of rainfall, split into a wetter season from November to April and a drier stretch from May to October. The terrestrial flora includes roughly nine fern species and 178 flowering plants, of which about 38 percent are thought to be endemic. Aldabra is best known for hosting the world's largest population of giant tortoises and the flightless Aldabra white-throated rail, and the atoll has been protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1982.

The Aleutian Islands tundra spans the 1,500-km arc of volcanic islands stretching from the Alaska Peninsula toward Russia's Kamchatka, plus the Pribilof Islands, dividing the North Pacific from the Bering Sea. Treeless maritime tundra covers the islands: dwarf scrub of crowberry and willows on exposed high ground, bluejoint-grass meadows on moist sites, and heath, sedge, and sphagnum bogs in the lowlands. The climate is cool and maritime, with mild winters, cool summers, and annual precipitation ranging from roughly 530 to 2,080 mm. About 98% of the ecoregion is protected within the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, which supports breeding habitat for an estimated 40 million seabirds.

The Allegheny Highlands forests stretch across the Allegheny Plateau of Pennsylvania and New York, a hilly landscape of deeply cut river valleys, waterfalls, and—in the glaciated New York portion—the Finger Lakes. Under a cold temperate climate, pre-settlement forests were dominated by hemlock-white pine-northern hardwoods, with eastern hemlock and beech most abundant alongside sugar maple, red maple, birch, white ash, and black cherry. Eastern hemlock, the ecoregion's flagship species, is now declining across much of the region due to the introduced hemlock woolly adelgid, while over-abundant white-tailed deer suppress forest regeneration.

The Alps conifer and mixed forests ecoregion follows the Alps mountain range across central Europe, spanning France, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Liechtenstein, Austria, and Slovenia. Its montane forests are a mix of conifers and broadleaves, with Norway spruce, silver fir, European larch, and mountain pine alongside European beech, and prostrate pine in the outer ranges. The region sits at the transition between the Mediterranean climates of southern Europe and the more humid, temperate Euro-Siberian zone, so its western reaches feel mild Atlantic air while the central area is continental. It is one of the richest places in Europe for plants, holding roughly 4,500 native vascular plant species including about 400 endemics, and the recovered Alpine ibex serves as its flagship species; around 27 percent of the ecoregion lies within protected areas such as Gran Paradiso and Vanoise national parks. For gardeners, several classic alpine ornamental genera are native here, including Campanula, Primula, Saxifraga, and Draba.

The Altai alpine meadow and tundra ecoregion crowns the high Altai Mountains where the borders of Russia, Kazakhstan, China, and Mongolia meet, sitting above the conifer treeline in Central Asia's northernmost ranges. Above the treeline, low-alpine meadows mix grasses such as Stipa feather grass and clumping Festuca with herbaceous wildflowers, dwarf birch (Betula rotundifolia) in wetter northern areas, and sedge-meadows of Kobresia and Carex, giving way to sparse moss, lichen, and creeping cushion plants on the highest plateaus. The climate has a distinctly arctic character, with brief temperate summers, extreme cold winters, and a tundra-like regime where no month averages above 10 degrees Celsius. The ecoregion supports apex predators including snow leopards, lynx, gray wolves, and wolverines, with the vulnerable Altai argali wild sheep serving as a flagship species. Higher slopes also host hardy ornamental and medicinal natives such as dwarf rhododendrons, saxifrage, rhodiola, juniper, and honeysuckle.

The Altai montane forest and forest steppe stretches some 1,500 km along the Altai Mountains across the border region where Russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and China meet, running from the Belukha Range in the northwest to the Gobi-Altai in the southeast. Its hallmark is a mosaic shaped by slope aspect: cooler, wetter north-facing slopes carry dense conifer forests of spruce and larch (including larch-cedar stands), while drier south-facing slopes give way to cold steppe and desert-steppe vegetation dominated by feather grass and Artemisia. The climate is cold and semi-arid, with cool summers and long, dry winters in which temperatures plunge well below freezing and precipitation stays low. Sitting at the crossroads of several ecoregions, altitudes, and climate zones, it harbors high biodiversity and supports a widely dispersed population of the globally threatened snow leopard, with protected areas including the Katun Nature Reserve. For gardeners, its hardy native flora includes ornamental grasses like the feather grass Stipa pennata and prairie junegrass (Koeleria).

The Altai steppe and semi-desert spans parts of Kazakhstan, China, and Russia, forming a transition zone between the conifer forests of the Altai Mountains and the drier Kazakh plains, with the upper Irtysh River and the Tarbagatay Mountains as landmarks. Grasslands dominate, characterized by fescue and feather-grass (Stipa) along with hardy shrubs, while poplar and willow line the watercourses. The climate is sharply continental, with short warm summers and long, cold, dry winters (a humid continental, warm-summer Dfb type). The region's dry grasslands support birds of prey, including endangered steppe eagles, saker falcons, and eastern imperial eagles, alongside the demoiselle crane and mammals such as Altai marmots and the elusive Pallas's cat. Much of the ecoregion remains lightly developed and used mainly for livestock grazing, though overgrazing and agricultural pressure are the main threats, with formal protection still limited.

The Alto Paraná Atlantic forests form the interior wing of South America's Atlantic Forest, sweeping inland from southern Brazil across eastern Paraguay and into Argentina's Misiones province, covering seven Brazilian states from Minas Gerais and São Paulo down to Rio Grande do Sul. The dominant habitat is Atlantic semi-deciduous forest, where emergent trees can reach about 35 meters and the canopy is built largely from the families Lauraceae, Apocynaceae, and Leguminosae, with many trees shedding leaves through the winter dry season. The climate is subtropical, receiving roughly 1,200 to 1,600 millimeters of rain per year, and the dry season from April through September brings frequent frosts. The region is a biodiversity stronghold, home to the endemic black lion tamarin, but it has been one of the most heavily cleared forests in the Neotropics, reduced by more than 90 percent of its original extent. For gardeners in mild subtropical climates, this is the native home of laurel- and legume-family trees adapted to a pronounced wet summer and dry, frost-prone winter.

The Amazon-Orinoco-Southern Caribbean mangroves form a vast coastal ecoregion in the Neotropics, fringing the Caribbean shores of Colombia and Venezuela and the Atlantic coasts of Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, and northeastern Brazil, including the Brazilian states of Amapá, Pará, and Maranhão. Shaped by the outflow of the Amazon and Orinoco rivers, its tidal wetlands are dominated by salt-tolerant mangroves such as Rhizophora racemosa and Avicennia schaueriana, alongside green buttonwood and the familiar red, white, and black mangroves. The climate is equatorial and fully humid, with year-round warmth roughly between 22 and 31 degrees Celsius and abundant rainfall averaging around 2,500 millimetres annually. These constantly flooded forests shelter rich birdlife and wildlife, from the scarlet ibis and American flamingo to giant otters, manatees, and nesting sea turtles, and the ecoregion's flagship is the critically endangered sapphire-bellied hummingbird. Though much of it remains relatively intact, mangrove stands here face mounting pressure from urbanization, pollution, and timber extraction.

This tiny temperate-grassland ecoregion covers Île Amsterdam and Île Saint-Paul, two remote French volcanic islands in the southern Indian Ocean lying roughly 3,000 km from any continent, in the open ocean between Australia, Antarctica, and southern Africa. At lower elevations the volcanic slopes are clothed in tussock grasslands and sedge meadows, while Amsterdam Island also harbors the small evergreen tree Phylica, the only native tree, growing among ferns; shrubs, bogs, and mosses take over on the higher plateau. The climate is cool and oceanic, with mild temperatures that swing only narrowly between winter and summer, abundant year-round rainfall near 1,100 mm, persistent westerly winds, and high humidity. As an isolated island system it combines relatively few species with high endemism, and it is a vital breeding ground for seabirds, subantarctic fur seals, and penguins; its flagship is the critically endangered, endemic Amsterdam albatross, with only about 30 breeding pairs in a given year. Past woodland clearing by whalers and sealers and introduced grazing animals (since removed) reshaped the native vegetation, and several endemic birds have already been lost since human arrival.

The Amur meadow steppe stretches across two sections of the middle Amur River valley, straddling the Russian Far East (Amur Oblast and Khabarovsk Krai) and northeastern China (Heilongjiang province). Because the land is a flat floodplain on alluvial soil with a high water table and frequent flooding, it has remained largely free of forest, instead supporting extensive wetlands of bogs and grasslands; wet meadows are dominated by reed grasses (Calamagrostis) alongside many members of the parsley family (Apiaceae) and Spiraea shrubs, with Mongolian oak and Daurian birch also present. The climate is humid continental of the cool-summer subtype (Koppen Dwb), with long, cold winters and short, cool summers. The region is a stronghold for threatened wildlife, including the red-crowned crane, Oriental stork, and Blakiston's eagle-owl, while the kaluga sturgeon serves as the ecoregion's flagship species. Much of it has been converted to cropland and only a small fraction is protected, within reserves such as Khingan and Bolshekhekhtsirsky.

The Anatolian conifer and deciduous mixed forests cover the mountains and plateaus of southwestern Anatolia in Turkey, a transitional zone where Mediterranean conditions grade into increasingly continental climate moving from west to east. Its forests are a mosaic of pines and deciduous broadleaf trees: Turkish pine (Pinus brutia) holds the western foothills and inland depressions, while the emblematic Anatolian black pine (Pinus nigra ssp. pallasiana) dominates the drier east and higher elevations, mixing with oaks (Quercus cerris, Q. pubescens, Q. robur, Q. frainetto), sweet chestnut, Oriental beech, and juniper. The climate is broadly Mediterranean, with hot dry summers and rainy winters and annual precipitation ranging roughly 400 to 600 mm. The region shelters brown bears, grey wolves, Saker falcons, and the critically endangered long-legged wood frog, and its wetlands are vital for migratory waterfowl such as Dalmatian pelicans and white-headed ducks; it is classified as critical or endangered, with only a small fraction of its area protected. For gardeners, several plants native here are familiar ornamentals, including the cedar of Lebanon (Cedrus libani) and sweet chestnut.

The Andaman Islands rain forests cover the Andaman archipelago in the eastern Bay of Bengal, most of which forms part of India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, with the Coco Islands at the northern end belonging to Myanmar. The vegetation grades from coastal mangroves dominated by the family Rhizophoraceae into inland evergreen and deciduous forests dominated by tall trees of the family Dipterocarpaceae. The climate is tropical and monsoonal, with temperatures generally between 22 and 30 degrees Celsius and annual rainfall of roughly 3,000 to 3,800 millimetres falling mainly in the monsoon season, when cyclonic winds and thunderstorms are common. These islands are a notable storehouse of plant diversity: over 2,500 flowering plant species have been recorded, about 10 percent of them endemic, alongside endemic birds such as the flagship Andaman serpent-eagle, though forest clearing and over-exploitation remain pressing threats. For gardeners drawn to tropical genera, native trees here include Dipterocarpus and the prized Andaman padauk, Pterocarpus dalbergioides.

The Angolan montane forest-grassland mosaic occupies the west-central highlands of Angola, running along the inland margin of the escarpment some 50 to 100 km from the coast across Huambo, Cuanza Sul, and Huila provinces, and crowned by isolated peaks such as Mount Moco, Mount Mepo, and Mount Lubangue that all rise above 2,500 meters. Open montane grassland dominates above roughly 1,600 meters, studded with Protea sugarbushes and Erica shrubs and grasses such as Themeda triandra, while small forest patches survive in humid ravines and on higher slopes where yellowwood (Podocarpus latifolius) shares an irregular 8-to-15-meter canopy with trees like Polyscias fulva and Ilex mitis. The climate brings wet summers with mist and rainfall through much of the year, though dry-season fires are common and frosts occur on the highest ground. The highlands support dozens of endemic and near-endemic species, including the flagship Angola cave-chat and the threatened Swierstra's francolin, yet the ecoregion is rated Critical/endangered and contains no protected areas. For gardeners the region is the native home of ornamental staples such as Protea, Erica, and Podocarpus.

The Angolan mopane woodlands stretch across southwestern Angola and northern Namibia, running along the Owambo Basin and surrounding the salt flats of the Etosha Pan. As the name suggests, the ecoregion is dominated by the mopane tree (Colophospermum mopane), which grows as a single-stemmed tree up to about 10 meters tall or, where conditions are harsher, as a dense shrub, alongside associated Acacia, Combretum, and Commiphora species. The climate is dry, with rainfall concentrated in the summer and peaking in late summer. The woodlands shelter elephants, black and white rhinoceros, lion, and cheetah, as well as the near-endemic black-faced impala, and the wider region is anchored by protected areas including Namibia's Etosha National Park. Mopane here also has a direct human use, as the caterpillars of the mopane emperor moth are gathered locally as food.

The Angolan scarp savanna and woodlands form a long, narrow strip along the coast of Angola, running from the Atlantic shore up the steep west-facing escarpment that climbs roughly 1,000 meters to the country's central plateau. Vegetation shifts dramatically with elevation, grading from dry woodland and wooded grassland—where baobab, Strychnos, and Acacia welwitschii grow—up to humid mist and cloud forests whose canopy includes Khaya anthotheca, Bombax buonopozense, and Spathodea campanulata. The climate is tropical with summer rains; the coastal belt, cooled by the Benguela Current, stays humid but receives relatively little rain, while the escarpment is far wetter. Despite being poorly studied and only partly protected within reserves such as Quiçãma National Park, the region is rich in endemics, including the red-crested turaco and the grey-striped francolin, and is classified as Vulnerable. For gardeners, the showy African tulip tree (Spathodea campanulata), grown as an ornamental in warm climates worldwide, is native to these escarpment forests.

The Angolan wet miombo woodlands blanket most of the central Angolan plateau and extend north into the Democratic Republic of the Congo, sitting largely at elevations between about 1,000 and 1,500 meters. The defining habitat is miombo woodland, a moist deciduous broadleaf savanna dominated by legume trees of the family Fabaceae (subfamily Caesalpinioideae), especially the genera Brachystegia, Julbernardia, and Isoberlinia, with grassland and sandy-soil openings between the stands. The climate is tropical and notably wetter than the surrounding savanna, with rainfall strongly concentrated in the hot summer months from roughly November to March. The ecoregion is the stronghold of the giant sable antelope (Hippotragus niger variani), a critically endangered Angolan endemic protected at Cangandala National Park, and it also harbors a strict-endemic rodent, Vernay's climbing mouse. For gardeners, the signature native flora here are the canopy-forming Brachystegia and Isoberlinia legume trees that give the miombo its character.

This tundra ecoregion is scattered across the cold Southern Ocean south of New Zealand and Australia, gathering five remote island groups: the Bounty Islands, Auckland Islands, Antipodes Islands, and Campbell Island (New Zealand), plus Macquarie Island (Australia). Its windswept landscape is dominated by tussock grassland threaded with cushion plants and showy "megaherbs" such as Pleurophyllum and Stilbocarpa, while sheltered pockets of the Auckland Islands and Campbell Island hold some of the world's southernmost forests of southern rata (Metrosideros umbellata). The climate is harsh and relentlessly wet, with strong westerly winds and precipitation falling on more than 300 days a year. Despite low overall species richness, the isolation has driven notable endemism, and the islands shelter roughly half the world's albatross species along with vast penguin colonies and endemic land birds like the Antipodes parakeet. Gardeners may recognize the giant-flowered megaherb genera and the tree fern Cyathea among the flora native to these subantarctic islands.

The Mixed Mesophytic — the most species-diverse temperate hardwood forest in North America — covers the Cumberland Plateau and adjacent unglaciated dissected uplands of West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, southern Ohio, southwestern Virginia, and eastern Tennessee. Sugar maple, American beech, tulip poplar, yellow buckeye, basswood, and white ash share cove-forest canopies with more than two dozen co-dominant species — a richness inherited from being ice-sheet-free during the Pleistocene.

The Blue Ridge province — the eastern spine of the southern Appalachians from southern Pennsylvania through northern Georgia. Cove hardwoods on protected slopes, oak-hickory mid-slope, northern hardwoods + spruce-fir on the highest peaks (Mt. Mitchell to 6,684 ft). Long the eastern US's wettest non-coastal region; many endemic plants tied to perched coves.

The Apennine deciduous montane forests occupy the higher elevations of the Apennine Mountains running down the spine of the Italian peninsula, surviving as disconnected patches that stretch southward for over 350 kilometers through central Italy. The dominant cover is montane broadleaf forest led by European beech (Fagus sylvatica), often mixed with silver fir (Abies alba), deciduous oaks (Quercus), maples (Acer), whitebeams and rowans (Sorbus), with cold meadows and grasslands taking over above the treeline. The climate is temperate-cool and notably wet, with rainfall ranging from roughly 1,000 mm in the southern mountains to 2,500 mm in the north and abundant winter snow at altitude. The ecoregion is the last stronghold of the critically endangered Marsican brown bear and the endemic Apennine (Abruzzo) chamois, and a 2017 assessment found about 46 percent of its area falls within protected reserves such as Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise National Park. For gardeners, several ornamental woody genera native here, including holly (Ilex aquifolium), yew (Taxus baccata) and linden (Tilia), are familiar temperate landscape plants.

The Apure-Villavicencio dry forests stretch along the eastern foot of the Andes' eastern cordillera, spanning the Venezuelan states of Portuguesa, Barinas and Apure and the Colombian departments of Arauca, Casanare and Meta. This is a transitional ecoregion, a patchwork of premontane, gallery and deciduous dry forest grading into savanna where the Andean montane forests give way to the lowland Llanos grasslands. Characteristic woody plants include mesquite (Prosopis juliflora), palo verde (Cercidium praecox), kapok (Ceiba pentandra), yellow mombin (Spondias mombin), and palms such as the moriche (Mauritia flexuosa) and macaúba (Acrocomia aculeata). Its climate is equatorial with a pronounced dry winter (Köppen Aw), with temperatures ranging from about 19 to 33 degrees Celsius. The forests have been severely degraded by deforestation, farming and ranching, leaving poorly protected remnants that the World Wildlife Fund rates as Vulnerable, yet they still shelter the giant anteater, Geoffroy's spider monkey, and the flagship Colombian four-eyed frog. Gardeners may recognize several natives here as ornamentals, including the stately kapok tree and the moriche and macaúba palms.

The Arabian Desert is a vast, disjointed Palearctic ecoregion that occupies most of the Arabian Peninsula and reaches across Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, southwestern Iran, Egypt's Sinai, and Israel's Negev. Sandy and gravel plains, elevated plateaus, and seasonal valleys called wadis dominate the terrain, supporting sparse, drought-adapted vegetation in which Acacia trees, Tamarix shrubs, and saltbushes such as Cornulaca and Salsola are characteristic, with Calligonum on dune slopes and Prosopis cineraria along desert margins. The climate is hot and arid, with very low and variable rainfall and extreme summer heat. Despite limited overall biodiversity, the region shelters specially adapted wildlife including the Arabian oryx, sand gazelles, and the Asian houbara bustard, its flagship species, but it remains poorly protected and is degraded by overgrazing, poaching, and off-road vehicle damage. For gardeners, the hardy native Acacia and Prosopis trees illustrate the drought-tolerant genera suited to hot, dry conditions.

The Arabian Sand Desert spans the great sand seas of the Arabian Peninsula, lying predominantly in Saudi Arabia and crossing into the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, and Oman; it takes in the Rub' al-Khali, or Empty Quarter, the world's largest sand desert, along with the an-Nafud, ad-Dahna, and al-Jafurah dune fields of linear and crescent dunes interspersed with gravel and gypsum plains. Vegetation is sparse and highly drought-adapted, with Calligonum shrubs colonizing dune slopes alongside chenopod genera such as Cornulaca and Haloxylon, while scattered trees including Acacia ehrenbergiana and the ghaf (Prosopis cineraria) persist mainly along the desert margins. The climate is hyper-arid and intensely hot, with summer temperatures that can exceed 50 degrees Celsius and scant, seasonal rainfall that falls off from north to south. Despite its name, the Empty Quarter is far from lifeless: it is the stronghold for the reintroduced Arabian oryx, the ecoregion's flagship species, which was restored after near-extinction from overhunting in the mid-twentieth century. Gardeners drawn to xeric planting will recognize ghaf (Prosopis cineraria) and Acacia among the heat- and drought-hardy genera native here.

The Arabian-Persian Gulf Coastal Plain Desert traces the eastern seaboard of the Arabian Peninsula along the Arabian-Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman, taking in coastal stretches of Kuwait, eastern Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman while encompassing the entire land area of Qatar and Bahrain. It is a mosaic of low coastal habitats: rocky shores, intertidal mudflats, salt marshes known as sabkha, gravel hammada, sand dunes, and pockets of Avicennia mangrove, where vegetation is dominated by salt-tolerant halophytes and sparse desert shrubs and grasses such as Haloxylon salicornicum, Rhanterium, and the sedge Cyperus conglomeratus. The climate is hot and intensely arid, with annual rainfall below roughly 100 millimeters across most of the region. These shores form a haven for wildlife, hosting the world's largest breeding population of the Socotra cormorant alongside sand gazelle, wintering shorebirds, and sandy beaches that serve as nesting sites for several threatened sea turtle species. Only about four percent of the ecoregion is protected, and coastal development, overgrazing, and overfishing remain the principal threats.

The Araucaria moist forests stretch across the highlands of southern Brazil, spanning the states of São Paulo, Paraná, Santa Catarina, and Rio Grande do Sul, and reaching into Misiones Province in northeastern Argentina. Their signature is the Brazilian araucaria (Araucaria angustifolia), a monkey puzzle conifer that rises in a tall emergent layer above a broadleaf canopy of laurel (Ocotea), myrtle, and legume trees such as Mimosa scabrella. Lying above roughly 500 metres on mountains and plateaus, the ecoregion has an oceanic, subtropical to temperate climate with no dry season, frequent winter frosts, and high annual rainfall. It shelters threatened and endemic wildlife including the brown howler monkey and the red-spectacled (red-spectacled amazon) parrot, yet much of the original forest has been cleared and only a small fraction is protected. For gardeners in suitably cool, frost-touched climates, the emblematic Araucaria angustifolia is itself a striking ornamental conifer native to this region.

The Aravalli West Thorn Scrub Forests stretch across the northwestern Indian subcontinent, running along the ancient Aravalli Range through the Indian states of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab, and Jammu and Kashmir before crossing into Pakistan's Punjab and Sindh provinces. This is xeric thorn scrub: a stunted, open canopy dominated by Acacia species rarely taller than six meters, mixed with Prosopis cineraria, Salvadora, Grewia, Ziziphus, Anogeissus, Capparis, Gardenia, and Carissa. The climate is hot semi-arid to arid, with summer daytime temperatures exceeding 45 degrees Celsius and winter nights that can drop below freezing. Despite heavy clearance for agriculture and grazing, the ecoregion supports a notably rich carnivore community, with the Indian desert cat as its flagship species alongside leopard, caracal, striped hyena, and grey wolf, plus more than 400 bird species including the great Indian bustard and lesser florican. Only about four percent of this vast landscape is protected.

The Araya and Paria xeric scrub stretches along Venezuela's northeastern Caribbean coast, covering the Araya and Paria peninsulas, the area around Cumaná, and the offshore islands of Margarita, Coche, and Cubagua. Its vegetation is a mosaic of salt-tolerant dune herbs, dry thorn scrub studded with columnar and prickly-pear cacti such as Stenocereus and Opuntia, and low deciduous woodland with trees including Bursera, Prosopis, and Parkinsonia, grading into semi-deciduous and evergreen forest on the higher hills. The climate is hot and markedly arid, with average temperatures around 24 to 27 degrees Celsius and rainfall that is very sparse on the Araya Peninsula but much higher on the wetter Paria slopes. The ecoregion harbors notable wildlife, most famously the threatened yellow-shouldered amazon parrot, alongside breeding sea turtles and a number of endemic plants, yet it is considered critically threatened by overgrazing, deforestation, sand extraction, and coastal urbanization. For gardeners in hot, dry climates, several drought-hardy genera native here, including the cacti Stenocereus and Opuntia and the flowering tree Parkinsonia, are widely grown as ornamentals.

The Arctic Coastal Tundra spans most of Alaska's northern coastline, a low coastal plain (0-150 m) along the Beaufort Sea in the Nearctic realm. Poorly drained terrain is dotted with thaw lakes covering up to half the ecoregion, and vegetation is dominated by wet tundra, fens, bogs, and marshes of grasses, sedges, and mosses, with dwarf shrubs on better-drained ground. The Arctic climate brings low precipitation (100-300 mm) and continuous, ice-rich permafrost with ice wedges and pingos. Its flagship species is the beluga whale; only about 4% lies in protected areas though most remains intact.

The Arctic foothills tundra is a transitional belt of rounded hills and plateaus spanning northwestern Alaska, northern Yukon, and the northwestern Northwest Territories, lying between the Arctic Coastal Tundra to the north and the Brooks-British Range Tundra to the south. Its better-drained terrain—with fewer thaw lakes than the saturated coast—supports moist tussock sedges, dwarf shrubs, and scrub, with open white spruce stands mixed with balsam poplar and willow along the Noatak River Valley. The climate is Arctic, with continuous, thick permafrost and an active layer averaging about 1 m, while much of the landscape escaped glaciation during the Pleistocene. The region remains roughly 99% intact, though the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, Dalton Highway, and coal and mineral mining pose growing threats; the gyrfalcon is its flagship species.

The Arizona Mountains forests — the sky-island and Mogollon Rim forest belt of central and eastern Arizona, southwestern New Mexico, and a thin strip in adjacent Mexico. Elevation banding from desert grassland and pinyon-juniper through ponderosa pine + Gambel oak, Douglas fir + aspen + white fir at higher elevations, and isolated subalpine spruce-fir on the highest peaks (Humphreys Peak, Mt. Baldy). The 'Madrean sky islands' on the southern edge connect biotic elements of the Sierra Madre Occidental with the Southwest US.

The Arnhem Land tropical savanna covers the rugged Arnhem Land peninsula and its offshore islands, including the Tiwi Islands, Groote Eylandt, and the Wessel Islands, in Australia's Northern Territory. Eucalypt open forests dominate the landscape, led by Darwin stringybark (Eucalyptus tetrodonta) and Darwin woollybutt (Eucalyptus miniata) over a tall understory of Sorghum grasses, interspersed with monsoon rainforest patches, mangroves, and Melaleuca swamp forests. The climate is tropical and strongly monsoonal, with a summer wet season and a largely rainless dry season. Long isolation has made it exceptionally diverse: over 1,900 plant taxa have been recorded, at least 200 of them found nowhere else, and a 2017 assessment found that 36% of the ecoregion lies within protected areas such as Kakadu National Park.

This ecoregion covers Ascension Island, a small volcanic British Overseas Territory in the equatorial Atlantic Ocean, roughly 1,200 km northwest of St. Helena and about 1,700 km from the African mainland. Its natural cover is dry grassland and scrubland with few if any trees, with much of the north and west marked by barren, desert-like ground broken by patches of grass and the endemic Ascension spurge (Euphorbia origanoides), the island's only endemic lowland plant. The climate is subtropical and semi-arid, with temperatures ranging from about 10 to 32 degrees Celsius and low mean annual rainfall around 709 mm, divided into a hotter season and a cooler one. Before human settlement the island supported only 25 to 30 plant species, ten of them endemic, including the shrub Oldenlandia adscensionis, the grass genus Sporobolus, and several endemic ferns such as Asplenium ascensionis and Pteris adscensionis. Today the island is one of the most important seabird breeding sites in the tropical Atlantic, home to the endemic Ascension frigatebird (Fregata aquila) and a globally significant green turtle nesting population, though introduced prickly pear and Mexican thorn now press on its sparse native flora.

The Atacama Desert ecoregion runs as a continuous strip for nearly 1,000 kilometers along the narrow coast of the northern third of Chile, extending toward southern Peru, within the Neotropic realm. Its interior is one of the driest places on Earth and almost without vegetation, while life concentrates on coastal slopes and ravines where Pacific fog and winter drizzle sustain isolated oases known as lomas. Characteristic plants include columnar and cushion cacti such as Eulychnia, Copiapoa, Browningia, and Leucostele, alongside bromeliads on sandy ground and the endemic tamarugo tree, with around 550 species of ferns, gymnosperms, and flowering plants recorded. Endemism here can exceed 60 percent, and the desert is the largest fog desert on the planet, supporting a sparse but highly adapted fauna whose flagship is Darwin's leaf-eared mouse. For gardeners, several of its hardy succulents, notably Copiapoa cacti, are prized ornamentals well suited to arid, low-water plantings.

The Atlantic Coast restingas form a chain of coastal sand forests strung in well-defined enclaves along Brazil's Atlantic coast, running from the country's northeast to its southeast and from the tropics into the subtropics. These restingas grow on low-elevation plains of sandy, acidic, and nutrient-poor soils, supporting a five-to-fifteen-meter Atlantic forest of medium-sized trees and shrubs rich in the myrtle, legume, and spurge families, with vegetation ranging from low scrub to taller stands. Because the ecoregion stretches across a long latitudinal gradient, its climate shifts from tropical in the north to subtropical in the south. It shelters notable wildlife including the flagship red-tailed Amazon and the endemic Santa Cruz dwarf frog, yet the habitat has been reduced by more than 90 percent, with urban expansion the chief threat; surviving fragments are safeguarded in protected areas such as Jurubatiba Sandbank National Park.

The Atlantic coastal pine barrens — the fire-dependent pitch pine + scrub oak ecosystem of the New Jersey Pinelands, Long Island Pine Barrens, Cape Cod, and smaller patches across coastal Massachusetts and adjacent Rhode Island / Connecticut / Delaware. Sandy, acidic, nutrient-poor soils plus historic frequent fire produced the open canopy and rich heath / sedge understory. The NJ Pinelands National Reserve protects the largest remnant.

The Australian Alps montane grasslands occupy the highest reaches of the Great Dividing Range in southeast Australia, spanning the Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales, and Victoria, and form the only ecoregion on the continent with true alpine ecosystems. Above the snow gum treeline of Eucalyptus pauciflora and black sallee (E. stellulata) lies a mosaic of Poa snow-grass tussock grasslands, alpine herbfields, heath, and sphagnum bogs, dotted with shrubs such as Grevillea, Prostanthera, Orites, and Hovea and the mountain plum-pine (Podocarpus lawrencei), the only alpine conifer on the Australian mainland. The climate is harsh and alpine, with prolonged winter snow cover, cold windy winters, and a pronounced winter dry spell, and the massif captures a large share of the continent's rainfall. It shelters cold-adapted endemics including the mountain pygmy possum (Burramys parvus), which hibernates under the snow, and the black-and-yellow corroboree frog (Pseudophryne corroboree), and most of the range now lies within large contiguous national parks such as Kosciuszko, Namadgi, and Alpine, though feral horses and deer, fire, and a warming climate threaten its specialised flora and fauna. Several genera native here, notably Grevillea and the mint bushes (Prostanthera), are familiar to gardeners as cold-hardy ornamentals.

The Azerbaijan shrub desert and steppe is a Deserts and Xeric Shrublands ecoregion occupying the Kura-Aras lowlands west of the Caspian Sea, with about seventy percent in Azerbaijan and the rest reaching into southeastern Georgia and northwestern Iran. It is the driest part of the Caucasus, a mosaic of wormwood (Artemisia) and saltwort (Salsola) semi-desert, feather-grass (Stipa) and yellow-bluestem steppe, and open pistachio-juniper woodlands, with riparian forests and wetlands along river floodplains. The climate is semi-arid to arid, temperate and continental, with long hot summers, short mild winters, and average annual precipitation of roughly 300 to 400 millimeters. Despite high endemism and a role as home to the world's largest population of goitered gazelle, only about six percent of the ecoregion lies within protected areas such as Shirvan and Aghgol national parks. For gardeners in dry, continental climates, the region's native flora includes drought-adapted ornamentals like feather grasses (Stipa) and endemic irises.

The Azores temperate mixed forests cover the Azores archipelago, an autonomous region of Portugal whose nine principal volcanic islands lie roughly 1,350 to 1,500 km west of the Portuguese mainland. Lowland areas retain little natural vegetation, but above about 500 meters elevation enclaves of evergreen shrub forest persist, characterized by trees such as Laurus azorica, Juniperus brevifolia, Picconia azorica, and Erica azorica. The Gulf Stream gives the islands a mild maritime climate for their latitude, with summer averages near 21 degrees C and winter averages around 14.5 degrees C, and frost does not occur below 500 meters. The ecoregion is home to the endemic Azores bullfinch and the endemic Azores noctule bat; native laurel and juniper forests have been heavily displaced by introduced poplar, oak, and chestnut and by aggressive invasives. Gardeners may recognize native ornamentals from here, including the Azores blueberry (Vaccinium cylindraceum) and Azorean holly (Ilex perado subsp. azorica).

The Badghyz and Karabil semi-desert is a Palearctic desert-and-xeric-shrubland ecoregion spread across a hilly plateau north of the Paropamiz Mountains, the northernmost range of the Hindu Kush, taking in parts of Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Iran. Its signature landscape is a savanna-like open woodland of wild pistachio (Pistacia vera) rising above a ground layer of drought-tolerant desert sedges (Carex), with Artemisia shrubs and saltwort on drier and saline ground. The climate is cold semi-arid, with hot dry summers and milder, wetter winters. The region is botanically rich, holding more than 1,100 vascular plant species along with local endemics, and its flagship animal is the Asian wild ass, or Turkmenian kulan, which alongside goitered gazelle and urial is protected in reserves such as the Badhyz State Reserve. For gardeners, the area is also the native home of showy wild bulbs, including the red-flowered Tulipa kuschkensis.

The Bahamian pineyards are a tropical and subtropical coniferous forest ecoregion spanning the northern Bahamas, on Grand Bahama, Abaco, Andros, and New Providence, together with the Caicos Islands of the Turks and Caicos. The canopy is dominated by the Bahamian pine (Pinus caribaea var. bahamensis), a variety botanically distinct from other Caribbean pines and adapted to sandy, salty ground, growing over a broad-leaved shrub understory that includes poisonwood (Metopium toxiferum), thatch palms, and the endemic five-finger. These are fire-maintained, pyrogenic forests; pollen records indicate a largely anthropogenic origin, with the modern pineyards established by about 1200 CE following Lucayan land clearing. The ecoregion carries a Critical/Endangered status and shelters notable wildlife, including endemic birds such as the Bahama yellowthroat, Bahama woodstar, and Bahama oriole, rock iguanas (Cyclura) and boas (Epicrates), and the wintering Kirtland's warbler, while logging, invasive species, and intensifying hurricanes such as Dorian remain serious threats. For gardeners, the understory native pinepink orchid (Bletia purpurea) is among the ornamental plants found here.

The Bahamian-Antillean mangroves form a Neotropical mangrove ecoregion scattered across the islands of the Caribbean and the western Atlantic, spanning jurisdictions that include Cuba, The Bahamas, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Jamaica, Puerto Rico, the Turks and Caicos, the Cayman Islands, and the US Virgin Islands. Its tidal forests are built from four characteristic salt-tolerant trees: red mangrove (Rhizophora mangle), black mangrove (Avicennia germinans), white mangrove (Laguncularia racemosa), and buttonwood (Conocarpus erectus). The climate is subtropical and strongly hurricane-exposed, with rainfall declining from the wetter northern islands toward the drier south. These shallow-water forests shelter notable wildlife, serving as habitat for West Indian manatees, marine turtles, and American flamingos, with the Northern Bahamian rock iguana recognized as the ecoregion's flagship species. Coastal tourism development and sea-level rise are leading threats, which matters to gardeners because buttonwood (Conocarpus) native here is among the region's hardiest salt- and wind-tolerant coastal plants.

The Bahia coastal forests stretch along a roughly 150-kilometer-wide belt of eastern Brazil's Atlantic coast, spanning the states of Bahia and Espírito Santo from near the Itapicuru River south to the Itapemirim. They form part of the larger Atlantic Forest, with Atlantic evergreen moist and semi-deciduous broadleaf forests as the predominant vegetation, including several species of Inga, bambusoid grasses, and the Paissava palm growing on nutrient-poor yellow-red soils. The climate is hot and humid, with rainfall of about 1,200 to 1,800 millimeters spread fairly evenly through the year, though the southern reaches see a drier stretch from May through September. The ecoregion is extraordinarily rich in endemic plants, birds, primates, and butterflies and shelters threatened wildlife such as the maned three-toed sloth and the golden-headed lion tamarin, yet it has been reduced by roughly 95 percent of its original cover, making it one of the most endangered habitats in Brazil.

The Bahia interior forests stretch across eastern Brazil, spanning the states of Sergipe, Bahia, Minas Gerais, Espírito Santo, and Rio de Janeiro as the inland wing of the Atlantic Forest, set between the coastal forests and Brazil's drier interior. Their dominant cover is seasonal moist to semi-deciduous forest, with characteristic trees including Cavanillesia, mahogany, and many legumes, alongside lower-canopy vine forests known locally as mata de cipo. The climate is tropical and semi-humid, with average annual rainfall between roughly 1,000 and 1,750 mm, mean annual temperatures of about 18 to 22 degrees Celsius, and a marked dry season of three to five months. The region shelters notable endemics such as the Coimbra-Filho's titi monkey and the northern muriqui, and the Mata do Passarinho Reserve here harbors the Stresemann's bristlefront, described as the rarest bird on the planet. It is among the most fragmented ecoregions of the Atlantic Forest, with few remnants larger than 10 square kilometers and only a small fraction under formal protection. Gardeners may recognize the prized Brazilian rosewood (Dalbergia nigra), a threatened timber tree native to these forests.

The Baja California desert spans the western Baja California Peninsula in Mexico, across both Baja California and Baja California Sur states, bounded by the Pacific to the west and the Peninsular Ranges to the east. Its xeric shrublands hold close to 500 vascular plant species, including the endemic boojum tree (Fouquieria columnaris), creosote bush, and many cacti, with roughly 23% of plant species endemic. The climate is dry and mostly subtropical; the Pacific Ocean adds humidity and moderates temperatures, while the driest interior areas receive less than 50 mm of rain a year. About 60% of the ecoregion lies in protected areas, including Mexico's El Vizcaíno Biosphere Reserve.

The Bajío dry forests cover the southwestern Mexican Plateau in west-central Mexico, spanning the states of Jalisco, Guanajuato, and Michoacán across the Lerma River basin and the lake country around Chapala, Cuitzeo, and Pátzcuaro. Set in valleys between roughly 1,000 and 2,000 meters on shallow, rocky, well-drained volcanic and limestone soils, the region was historically dry deciduous forest whose characteristic trees included copal, pochote, palo amarillo, and mauto, with thorn-scrub communities of mesquite and huamúchil. The climate is tropical subhumid, with annual rainfall around 500 to 930 millimeters and a pronounced dry season that can last up to eight months. This is one of Mexico's most developed and densely populated landscapes, and centuries of agriculture and grazing have reduced the forest to small pockets now dominated by thorn scrub and subtropical matorral, leaving the ecoregion classed as critical or endangered with only about 7.5 percent in protected areas. Gardeners working in comparably dry, seasonal climates may recognize natives of this region in drought-adapted, deciduous trees such as mesquite and copal.