T37x Iberoatlantic Pinus sylvestris forests
Description
Coniferous forests occurring in mountain areas where summers, by any combination of abundant direct sunlight, draining substrate and steep terrain, may become too dry for broadleaved deciduous trees like those dominating T172, T182, T1By and T1D7. In even drier, percolating limestones, the still smaller-leaved, drought-resistant T3D6 prevails, whereas submediterranean oak forests of the block T19 carry the day at lower elevations, with longer growing season and less risk of blizzards and other sorts of inclement winter weather. Dominant across the highlands of the ecoregion throughout the Pleistocene and the early Holocene, as shown by pollinic records, the demise of these forests, nowadays restricted to very local spots hostile to other trees, was surely accelerated by human Neolithic deforestation. In the original EUNIS framework, most of our remaining pine forests would fit in T3724 (Cantabrian Pinus sylvestris forests) and, consequently, in level IV T372 (Iberian silicicolous Pinus sylvestris forests); but that would force us to admit as well T371 (Iberian calcareous Pinus sylvestris forests) to include our handful of pine forests on limestones, a single regional level IV unit for the whole of our Pinus sylvestris forests being more in tune with the rest of our approach to forest classification.
Floristic Composition
Frequent species
Indicator species
Regional distribution
