Country

Argentina: 18 ecoregions. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

Eighteen ecoregions span Argentina, and the striking thing is how few of them are forest. Grassland and shrubland systems dominate: the Dry Chaco and Humid Chaco in the subtropical north, the Humid Pampas and Espinal at the center, the Low Monte scrub, and the vast Patagonian steppe running south. Forest holds the edges, with the Alto Paraná Atlantic forests and Southern Andean Yungas in the tropical north and the Valdivian temperate forests and Magellanic subpolar forests along the far southern Andes. The puna and steppe ecoregions of the high Andes add a cold, dry alpine tier. Gardeners therefore work across nearly the full temperature range, from frost-free subtropics to subantarctic cold, but most of the country's heartland is open-country climate: sun, wind, and grass-adapted plants rather than forest species.