Tropophilous Forest

The tropophilous forest is one of the fourteen large Biome S terrestrial, one finds there the tropical forests and subtropical dry where vegetation of the null and void type is omnipresent at the time of the dry season.

These forests currently occupy 11,5 fire, km million which transforms the vegetation into savanna is the principal threat for this biome. Its potential is estimated at 13,9 million km.

This biome is in particular marked by a deficit out of water and the plants are also marked by it.

Distribution

Geographical

This Biome is most widespread on the tropical areas:

5,5 million km in Africa along the two parallels tropical:

on the Tropic of Cancer (in North) of the Guinea to the Sudan.
on the Tropic of Capricorn (in the South) of the Angola to the Mozambique.

In Asia, it occupies part of the East of the Deccan, in India.
In America, it occupies part of the Central America as well as the tropical part of the the Andes.

Ecorégions

According to the classification of the Total 200, one observes tropophilous forests in the following areas:

In the Afrotropical, dry forests of Madagascar (Madagascar)
In the Australasian ,

in septentrional Indonesia, dry forests of Nusa Tenggara (Nusa Tenggara, islands of the small Probe)
the dry forests of New Caledonia (New Caledonia)

In the Indomalais,

dry forests of Indo-China (Indo-China)
In the East of the India: dry forests of Chhota-Nagpur

In the Néotropique

In South-west of the Mexico and with the Guatemala: the Mexican dry forests
the dry forests of the Andean valleys and Tumbesian (Colombia, Ecuador and Peru)
the forest dries of Chiquitano (Bolivia, Brésil)
the dry forests of the littoral Atlantique (in the North-East of the Brésil)

In the Océanien, the dry forests of Hawaii (Hawaii)

Climatology

The dry tropical forest is in general subjected to a intertropical Climat at alternated seasons, i.e. with a Saison dries and a rain season.

The Saison dries is located in winter in the northern hemisphere, summer in the southern hemisphere, and can last from 4 to 9 months.

The annual Précipitations reach on average 1000 to 2000 mm of rain according to the areas.

The annual temperature is subjected to weak temperature variations, its amplitude is of 5-10°C and its average is about 25-30°C, which classifies this climate in the climates known as " chauds".

Disappearance of the forest

This tropophilous forest is one of the Biome S which suffered the most from the Agriculture and thus of the Anthropisation.

It could provide to the Man many arable lands as well as easily exploitable wood resources, which led to the disappearance of many of these forests to the profits of Savane S.

It should be also noted that savanna sometimes came to occupy the place of the tropophilous forest naturally because the latter is very apprehensive fire of share the ambient dryness of the medium.

Vegetation

This type of vegetation comprises three levels:

With the short-nap cloth of the ground one finds Herbe S (Graminées).
On the second “floor”, one observes Arbuste S and many Buisson S.
the Cime is occupied by a Futaie from 10 to 15 m height on the plate X and Versant S, on the banks and in the alluvial valleys one observes a forest gallery with layer known as “high”.

The junction with savanna is carried out by a thorny dry forest.

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