The Halmahera rain forests cover Halmahera and its neighboring islands, including Bacan, Morotai, the Obi Islands, Ternate, Tidore, and Gebe, in the North Maluku province of eastern Indonesia. These mountainous, partly volcanic islands belong to Wallacea, a group that sits in the Australasian realm but was never joined to either Australia or Asia, so its plants and animals mix elements of both worlds and include many species found nowhere else. Tropical lowland and montane forest dominates, ranging from evergreen to semi-evergreen rainforest, with drier stands in southern rain shadows; characteristic trees include dipterocarps such as Shorea assamica and Vatica rassak. The climate is a tropical rainforest climate. The ecoregion is rich in endemic birds and is the home of the standardwing bird-of-paradise as well as Wallace's giant bee, the world's largest bee. For gardeners, this is the native range of two famous spice trees, clove (Syzygium aromaticum) and nutmeg (Myristica fragrans).
Marker placed inside the RESOLVE 2017 polygon at 0.9°N, 128.0°E.
Climate snapshot for this ecoregion
°C
°F
Current zone range (2011–2040)
13b
Plotwright
CHELSA-derived typical winter month at this ecoregion's bbox grid.
Projected (2041–2070)
13b
Plotwright
Where the CHELSA models say the typical winter month is heading.
Average warming this ecoregion is on track for: +2.9°F by mid-century. SSP3-7.0 (current trajectory) · CHELSA v2.1 bio06 sampled across 10 of 10 points within this ecoregion's bounding box.
At a glance
Dominant biome
Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
Realm
Australasia
Approximate area
10,372 sq mi
Conservation tier
Nature Could Reach Half Protected (Dinerstein NNH 2)
About the tropical & subtropical moist broadleaf forests biome
Warm, wet, highly productive forests — including tropical rainforests — with closed canopies, near year-round growing seasons, and the richest terrestrial biodiversity on Earth. Low seasonality and high rainfall sustain dense, layered vegetation from canopy to forest floor.
Catalog plants suited to this ecoregion
No catalog plants intersect this ecoregion's zone range. As the catalog grows to cover this region's climate band, suggestions will surface here.
Collections for this ecoregion
No curated collection's plants all fit this ecoregion's zone range. We surface a collection only when every member would grow here — partial fits get filtered out rather than mislead. As the catalog and the curated set both grow, this section will fill in.
Related ecoregions
Other tropical & subtropical moist broadleaf forests ecoregions to explore: