Floristic province

A floristic province is a geographic area with a relatively uniform composition of plant species. Adjacent floristic provinces do not usually have a sharp boundary, but rather a soft one, a transitional area in which many species from both regions overlap. The region of overlap is called a vegetation tension zone.

Explanation

Several systems of floristic provinces have been devised. Most systems are organized hierarchically, with the largest units subdivided into smaller geographic areas, which are made up of smaller floristic communities, and so on. Systems of floristic provinces have both significant similarities and differences with zoogeographic provinces, which follow the composition of mammal families, and with biogeographical provinces or terrestrial ecoregions, which take into account both plant and animal species.

Floristic kingdoms

Botanist Ronald Good identified six floristic kingdoms (boreal, Neotropical, Paleotropical, South African, Australian, and Antarctic), the largest natural units he determined for flowering plants. Good's six kingdoms are subdivided into smaller units, called provinces. The Paleotropical kingdom is divided into three subkingdoms, which are each subdivided into floristic provinces. Each of the other five kingdoms are subdivided directly into provinces. There is a total of 37 floristic provinces. Almost all provinces are further subdivided into floristic regions.

Armen Takhtajan, in a widely used scheme that builds on Good's work, identified thirty-five floristic regions, each of which is subdivided into floristic provinces, of which there are 152 in all.

Takhtajan's floristic provinces

Holarctic Kingdom

I. Circumboreal Region

:1 Arctic:2 Atlantic Europe:3 Central Europe:4 Illyria or Balkan:5 Pontus Euxinus:6 Caucasus:7 Eastern Europe:8 Northern Europe:9 Western Siberia:10 Altai-Sayan:11 Central Siberia:12 Transbaikalia:13 Northeastern Siberia:14 Okhotsk-Kamchatka:15 Canada incl. Great Lakes

II. Eastern Asiatic Region

:16 Manchuria:17 Sakhalin-Hokkaido:18 Japan-Korea:19 Volcano-Bonin:20 Ryukyu or Tokara-Okinawa:21 Taiwan:22 Northern China:23 Central China:24 Southeastern China:25 Sikang-Yuennan:26 Northern Burma:27 Eastern Himalaya:28 Khasi-Manipur

III. North American Atlantic Region

:29 Appalachians:30 Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain:31 North American Prairies

IV. Rocky Mountain Region

:32 Vancouver:33 Rocky Mountains

V. Macaronesian Region

:34 Azores:35 Madeira:36 Canaries:37 Cape Verde

VI. Mediterranean Region

:38 Southern Morocco:39 Southwestern Mediterranean:40 South Mediterranean:41 Iberia:42 Baleares:43 Liguria-Tyrrhenia:44 Adriatic:45 East Mediterranean:46 Crimea-Novorossijsk

VII. Saharo-Arabian Region

:47 Sahara:48 Egypt-Arabia

VIII. Irano-Turanian Region

:49 Mesopotamia:50 Central Anatolia:51 Armenia-Iran:52 Hyrcania:53 Turania or Aralo-Caspia:54 Turkestan:55 Northern Baluchistan:56 Western Himalaya:57 Central Tien Shan:58 Dzungaria-Tien Shan:59 Mongolia:60 Tibet

IX. Madrean Region

:61 Great Basin:62 California:63 Sonora:64 Mexican Highlands

Paleotropical Kingdom

X. Guineo-Congolian Region

:65 Upper Guinea:66 Nigeria-Cameroon:67 Congo

XI. Usambara-Zululand Region

:68 Zanzibar-Inhambane:69 Tongoland-Pondoland

XII. Sudano-Zambezian Region

:70 Zambezi:71 Sahel:72 Sudan:73 Somalia-Ethiopia:74 South Arabia:75 Socotra:76 Oman:77 South Iran:78 Sindia

XIII. Karoo-Namib Region

:79 Namibia:80 Namaland:81 Western Cape:82 Karoo

XIV. St.Helena and Ascension Region

:83 St. Helena and Ascension

XV. Madagascan Region

:84 Eastern Madagascar:85 Western Madagascar:86 Southern and Southwestern Madagascar:87 Comoro:88 Mascarenes:89 Seychelles

XVI. Indian Region

:90 Ceylon (Sri Lanka):91 Malabar:92 Deccan:93 Upper Gangetic Plain:94 Bengal

XVII. Indochinese Region

:95 South Burma:96 Andamans:97 South China:98 Thailand:99 North Indochina:100 Annam:101 South Indochina

XVIII. Malesian Region

:102 Malaya:103 Borneo:104 Philippines:105 Sumatra:106 South Malesia:107 Celebes:108 Moluccas and West New Guinea:109 Papua:110 Bismarck Archipelago

XIX. Fijian Region

:111 New Hebrides:112 Fiji

XX. Polynesian Region

:113 Micronesia:114 Polynesia

XXI. Hawaiian Region

:115 Hawaii

XXII. Neocaledonian Region

:116 New Caledonia

Neotropical Kingdom

XXIII. Caribbean Region

:117 Central America:118 West Indies:119 Galápagos Islands

XXIV. Region of the Guayana Highlands

:120 Guayana

XXV. Amazonian Region

:121 Amazonia:122 Llanos

XXVI. Brazilian Region

:123 Caatinga:124 Central Brazilian Uplands:125 Chaco:126 Atlantic Brazil:127 Parana

XXVII. Andean Region

:128 Northern Andes:129 Central Andes

South African Kingdom

XXVIII. Cape Region

:130 Cape

Australian Kingdom

XXIX. Northeast Australian Region

:131 North Australia:132 Queensland:133 Southeast Australia:134 Tasmania

XXX. Southwest Australian Region

:135 Southwest Australia

XXXI. Central Australian or Eremaean Region

:136 Eremaea

Antarctic Kingdom

XXXII. Fernandezian Region

:137 Juan Fernández

XXXIII. Chile-Patagonian Region

:138 Northern Chile:139 Central Chile:140 Pampas:141 Patagonia:142 Tierra del Fuego

XXXIV. Region of the South Subantarctic Islands

:143 Tristan-Gough:144 Kerguelen

XXXV. Neozeylandic Region

:145 Lord Howe:146 Norfolk:147 Kermadec:148 Northern New Zealand:149 Central New Zealand:150 Southern New Zealand:151 Chatham:152 New Zealand Subantarctic Islands

External references

* Good, Ronald, 1947. The Geography of Flowering Plants. Longmans, Green and Co, New York
* Takhtajan, Armen, 1986. Floristic Regions of the World. (translated by T.J. Crovello & A. Cronquist). University of California Press, Berkeley.