Tropical Wet Evergreen Forests

Tropical evergreen forests are usually found in areas receiving more than 200 cm of rainfall and having a temperature of 15 °C to 30 °C. They occupy about seven per cent of the Earth’s land surface and harbour more than half of the planet’s terrestrial plants and animals.

 In an equatorial region, The evergreen forest is green throughout the year and the tropics known as broad leaf evergreens (Broad leaf means any deciduous tree such as the maple or oak or any of certain evergreen trees distinguished from trees bearing needle like leaves such as most conifers by having relatively broad flat leaves) and in temperate and boreal latitudes known as coniferous evergreens (Part of trees or shrubs bearing cones and evergreen leaves).

~ Within high humidity and mild temperature areas, The moist forest, Mossy forests, Laurel forest, Cloud forest, Fog forest, Mountain forest are found which are the tropical (Here, Tropical seasonal forest is also known as moist deciduous, monsoon or semi-evergreen mixed seasonal forests have a monsoon or wet savannah climates receiving high overall rainfall with a warm summer wet season and a cooler winter dry season) or subtropical or mild temp evergreen forest usually at the canopy level. Moreover, Abundance of mosses that are covering the ground and vegetation are found in Cloud forests.

Tropical rain forests or evergreen forests are found in the areas where the temperature is 15 °C to 30 °C and 200 cm plus of rainfall and humidity should have more than 77% annually. These forests occupy 7% of the Earth’s land surface and harbor more than half of the planet’s terrestrial animals and plants. Generally these Tropical evergreen forests are multi-layered, Dense and harbor many types of animals and plants.

~ In India, evergreen forests are found on the eastern and western slopes of the Western Ghats in such states as Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Maharashtra. And also found in Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura, West Bengal and Andaman and Nicobar Islands. They are also found in the hills of Jaintia and Khasi.

~ In Indian tropical forests, Some of the trees found are rosewood, mahogany and ebony. Bamboo and reeds are also common. Because of dense foliage competing for light, little direct sunlight reaches the under story.

~ In southeastern United States, southern China and in southeastern Brazil, There are many subtropical broad leaved evergreen forests seen with the margins of major land masses other than this In northwestern North America, the wet temperate conifer forests are found.

~ Hence, Evergreen forests around the world are under threat of logging, pollution, oil and gas developments, mining, hydroelectric projects, and other human developments planned in these areas. 

~ Tropical wet evergreen forest grows in the area where temperature annually about 25°-27°C, Rainfall should exists 250 cm annually, Humidity exceeds 77% average annual and the dry season is short.

~ Due to high heat and high humidity the trees of these forests do not shed their leaves annually, at least not together, that’s why it is termed as evergreen forests.

~ These forest are very dense, Multilayered and lofty. The size of these trees reach up to 45 m height and individually can exceed 60m. View from above looks like a green carpet.

~ The sun light cannot reach the ground and owing to deep shade, the undergrowth is formed mainly of tangled mass of canes, bamboos, ferns, climbers, etc. A variety of orchids flourishes on the trees.

~ In India, The evergreen forests are found along the western side of the Western Ghats between 500 m to 1370 m above sea level in South Mumbai and in a strip, It goes from north-east to south-west direction across Arunachal Pradesh, Upper Assam, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura up to height of 1070 meters and in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. .

Tropical wet evergreen forest having the timer which is fine-grained, Durable and hard so it has high commercial value. The important species of these forests includes the Mesua, calophyllum, white cedar, toon, dhup, hopea, palaquium, canes, Jamun etc. Similarly on western Ghats, You can see bamboo, muli, mesua, agar, gurjan, jamun, chaplasha species mostly in Himalaya region. But these forests having fair commercial forests and due to absence of pure stands, Lack of transportation facilities, Dense Undergrowth, They have not been properly utilized in a great manner.