Country

British Virgin Islands: one ecoregion. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

The British Virgin Islands lie within a single ecoregion, the Caribbean shrublands, the dry scrub system that covers the low islands of the northeastern Caribbean. It fits: these are relatively low islands in a rain shadow of their own making, with seasonal rainfall, rocky slopes, and a native cover of drought-deciduous woodland, thorn scrub, cacti, and coastal strand plants rather than rainforest. Gardening here is dry-tropical gardening. The dependable unirrigated plants are the natives of the scrub itself plus the drought-proof garden mainstays that share their tolerances; water-hungry tropical effects need catchment or cistern support. The ecoregion rates Nature Could Recover, and on steep small islands the remaining native scrub does double duty as habitat and slope protection.