Pacific Temperate Rain Forest (WWF Ecoregion)
The Pacific temperate rain forests ecoregion of North America is the largest temperate rain forest ecoregion on the planet as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (other definitions exist). The Pacific temperate rain forests lie along the western side of the Pacific Coast Ranges along the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America from the Prince William Sound in Alaska through the British Columbia Coast to Northern California, and are part of the Nearctic ecozone, as also defined by the World Wildlife Fund. The Pacific temperate rain forests are characterized by a high amount of rainfall, in some areas more than 300 cm (120 inches) per year and moderate temperatures in both the summer and winter months (between 10-24°C).
This ecoregion is a subregion of the Cascadia bioregion.
These rain forests occur in a number of ecoregions, which vary in their species composition, but are predominantly of conifers, sometimes with an understory of broadleaf trees, ferns and shrubs. In the WWF's system, sub-ecoregions of the Pacific Temperate Rain Forests Ecoregion are the Northern Pacific coastal forests, Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia mainland coastal forests, Central Pacific coastal forests, Central and Southern Cascades forests, Klamath-Siskiyou forests, and Northern California coastal forests ecoregions.
The forests in the north contain predominantly Sitka Spruce and Western Hemlock, while those in the coastal forests are home as well to Coast Redwood (Sequoia sempervirens), Coast Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii), Western Redcedar and Shore Pine. Notably, the three tallest species of trees are found here. Dense growths of epiphytes and mosses cover the trees, and lush vegetation is present everywhere.
Hardwood trees such as the Bigleaf maple and the Alder are also common, especially at lower elevations and along stream banks, and are vital to the ecosystem, in part because of their nitrogen fixing.
Read more about Pacific Temperate Rain Forest (WWF Ecoregion): History, Ecology, Wildlife, Logging
Famous quotes containing the words pacific, temperate, rain and/or forest:
“The doctor of Geneva stamped the sand
That lay impounding the Pacific swell,
Patted his stove-pipe hat and tugged his shawl.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“The man who is aware of himself is henceforward independent; and he is never bored, and life is only too short, and he is steeped through and through with a profound yet temperate happiness. He alone lives, while other people, slaves of ceremony, let life slip past them in a kind of dream.”
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)
“Tasting of the sweet damp woods and of the rain one inch above the meadow:
It was like feasting upon air.”
—William Jay Smith (b. 1918)
“The forest of Compiegne. Look at it. Like a kind grandmother dozing in her rocking chair. Old trees practicing curtsies in the wind because they still think Louis XIV is king.”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)