The Northern Cordillera forests is a remote subarctic taiga ecoregion spanning the northern Rocky and Coast Mountains across interior British Columbia, southern Yukon, and a sliver of the Northwest Territories. Boreal forests of white and black spruce, lodgepole pine, and some paper birch and trembling aspen cloak lower elevations, giving way to subalpine fir and spruce and to dwarf birch and ericaceous shrubs above. The climate is cold, with a mean annual temperature around -2C and roughly 350-600 mm of precipitation, and discontinuous permafrost persists on lower north-facing slopes. The landscape includes striking volcanic features such as lava flows, cinder cones, and the Stikine River Canyon; Dall sheep is a flagship species, yet only about 9% of the ecoregion is protected.

At a glance

About the boreal forests/taiga biome

The vast northern forest belt of spruce, fir, pine, and larch, defined by long, severe winters and short growing seasons. Often underlain by permafrost and wetlands, the taiga forms one of the world’s largest terrestrial carbon stores.

National refinement sub-regions

Catalog plants suited to this ecoregion

Computed from each plant's stated USDA zone range against this ecoregion's NRCan Plant Hardiness Zone 1981-2010 GeoTIFF published current zone range, with the CHELSA mid-century warming delta applied for the projection. Plants whose stated range falls outside both the current and projected zone end up dropped; the rest land in one of the three buckets below.

Collections for this ecoregion

Curated multi-plant collections whose members all fit this ecoregion's zone range — no won't-grow members smuggled in. Overall fit class shown per collection is the weakest link across its members.

Related ecoregions