The Napo moist forests blanket the western Amazon basin east of the Andes, spanning the Amazon regions of southern Colombia, eastern Ecuador, and northern Peru, reaching from the Andean foothills almost to where the Napo and Solimoes rivers meet near Iquitos. This is tall, evergreen tropical rainforest with canopies around 40 meters, woven from a mosaic of well-drained terra firme upland and seasonally flooded varzea and igapo swamp forest, rich in palms. The climate is humid and tropical (Koppen Af) with a mean annual temperature near 26 degrees Celsius and some of the highest rainfall in all of Amazonia, up to about 4,000 millimeters in the west. Among the most species-rich forests on Earth, it shelters jaguars, giant otters, and Amazon river dolphins, yet the WWF rates it Critical or Endangered owing to oil development and deforestation. For gardeners, Ecuador's Yasuni reserve here harbors extraordinary orchid diversity, a hint of the epiphytes native to these warm, wet lowlands.
Marker placed inside the RESOLVE 2017 polygon at 2.0°S, 75.8°W.
Climate snapshot for this ecoregion
°C
°F
Current zone range (2011–2040)
13a-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: +3.8°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
Neotropic
Approximate area
97,208 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: