Country

Venezuela: 22 ecoregions. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

Twenty-two ecoregions reach Venezuela, most of them tropical moist broadleaf forest: the Guianan lowland, piedmont, and Highlands moist forests, the Negro-Branco moist forests, and the distinctive Pantepui forests & shrublands of the tabletop mountains. Between the forests and the Andes spread the Llanos, one of South America's great tropical grassland-savanna systems, while the Caribbean coast turns sharply dry in the La Costa xeric shrublands and Guajira-Barranquilla xeric scrub. The result is a country where rainfall, not temperature, draws the map: year-round warmth everywhere, but planting conditions running from rainforest humidity to seasonally flooded savanna to near-desert coast. Drainage and the wet-dry season rhythm matter more than hardiness; a plant suited to the Llanos will not be the plant for the arid littoral.