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An ecoregion (ecological region) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and contain characteristic, geographically distinct assemblages of natural communities and species .
Ecoregions may be identified by similarities in geology, physiography, vegetation, climate, soils, land use, wildlife distributions, and hydrology. The classification system has four levels, but only Levels I and III are on this list. Level I divides North America into 15 broad ecoregions; of these, 12 lie partly or wholly within the United States.
The region is known for low oxygen events and it contains extensive mud banks and a relatively wide continental shelf. It is a productive bioregion and supports major commercial fisheries. [4]: 102 In the 2011 assessment it was combined with the South-western Cape bioregion to form the Benguela ecoregion. [5] South-western Cape region
Bioregions became a foundational concept within the philosophical system called Bioregionalism.A key difference between an ecoregions and biogeography and the term bioregion, is that while ecoregions are based on general biophysical and ecosystem data, human settlement and cultural patterns play a key role for how a bioregion is defined.
This is a list of terrestrial ecoregions as compiled by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). The WWF identifies terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecoregions. The terrestrial scheme divides the Earth's land surface into 8 biogeographic realms, containing 867 smaller ecoregions. Each ecoregion is classified into one of 14 major habitat types, or biomes.
The California chaparral and woodlands is a terrestrial ecoregion of southwestern Oregon, northern, central, and southern California (United States) and northwestern Baja California , located on the west coast of North America. It is an ecoregion of the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome, and part of the Nearctic realm.
8.5 Trans-Saharan Africa, Madagascar and Arabia. Neotropic: 19.0 7.3 South America, Central America, the Caribbean, South Florida and the Falkland Islands. Australasia: 7.6 2.9 Australia, Melanesia, New Zealand, Lesser Sunda Islands, Sulawesi, Maluku Islands and the neighbouring islands. The northern boundary of this zone is known as the ...
A bioregion is defined along watershed and hydrological boundaries, and uses a combination of bioregional layers, beginning with the oldest "hard" lines; geology, topography, tectonics, wind, fracture zones and continental divides, working its way through the "soft" lines: living systems such as soil, ecosystems, climate, marine life, and the ...