North Atlantic moist mixed forests
RESOLVE 672
The North Atlantic moist mixed forests stretch along the western and northern coasts of Ireland and Scotland, taking in southwest and west Ireland, western Scotland and the Outer Hebrides, the far north of Scotland, and the Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland. Much of the landscape is now open blanket bog, dwarf-shrub heath, and rugged sea-cliff country, but the surviving semi-natural woodland is dominated by upland birch, native Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris), and Atlantic oak forest noted for its exceptional richness of mosses, lichens, liverworts, and ferns. The climate is warm-temperate with a strong oceanic influence, with annual temperatures generally ranging from 3 to 15 degrees Celsius and relatively high rainfall of roughly 1,000 to 1,500 mm. Despite extensive historical deforestation that left it classified as critical/endangered by the World Wildlife Fund, the ecoregion supports nearly a million breeding seabirds, including the world's largest gannet colony and Atlantic puffins, with the golden eagle as its flagship species. Gardeners in similar cool, wet, maritime climates may recognize natives of these heaths, such as ling heather (Calluna vulgaris) and bell heather (Erica cinerea).
About the temperate broadleaf & mixed forests biome
Four-season forests of deciduous hardwoods — oak, maple, beech — often mixed with conifers, shaped by warm summers and cold winters. Trees leaf out in spring and color in autumn; the generally fertile soils have made these forests heavily settled and farmed.
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.