The Myanmar coastal rain forests is a

tropical moist broadleaf forest Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests (TSMF), also known as tropical moist forest, is a subtropical and tropical forest habitat type defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Description TSMF is generally found in large, disco ...

ecoregion An ecoregion (ecological region) or ecozone (ecological zone) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas o ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

. The ecoregion occupies Myanmar's coastal lowlands along the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean, bounded on the west and northwest by India, on the north by Bangladesh, and on the east by Myanmar and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India. Its southern limit is a line bet ...

and

Andaman Sea The Andaman Sea (historically also known as the Burma Sea) is a marginal sea of the northeastern Indian Ocean bounded by the coastlines of Myanmar and Thailand along the Gulf of Martaban and west side of the Malay Peninsula, and separated fro ...

Geography

The Myanmar coastal rain forests occupy the coastal lowlands of Myanmar. It extends from the

Naf River The Naf River ( bn, নাফ নদী ''Naf Nodi'' ; my, နတ်မြစ် ; rki, ) is an international river marking the border of southeastern Bangladesh and northwestern Myanmar. Geography The Naf River's average depth is , and ma ...

, which forms the border between Myanmar and

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million pe ...

, along the Rakhine coast. It also occupies the lower basins of the Irrawaddy and Sittaung rivers, and the coastal lowlands of

Mon State Mon State ( my, မွန်ပြည်နယ်, ; mnw, တွဵုရးဍုင်မန်, italics=no) is an administrative division of Myanmar. It lies between Kayin State to the east, the Andaman Sea to the west, Bago Region to th ...

and

Tanintharyi Region Tanintharyi Region ( my, တနင်္သာရီတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; Mon: or ; ms, Tanah Sari; formerly Tenasserim Division and subsequently Tanintharyi Division, th, ตะนาวศรี, RTGS: ''Tanao Si'', ; ...

along the Andaman Sea. In Rakhine it is bounded on the east by the Mizoram–Manipur–Kachin rain forests, which occupy the lower slopes of the

Arakan Mountains The Arakan Mountains ( my, ရခိုင်ရိုးမ), also known as the Rakhine Yoma, are a mountain range in western Myanmar, between the coast of Rakhine State and the Central Myanmar Basin, in which flows the Irrawaddy River. It is th ...

. In the Irrawaddy and Sittaung basins, the

Irrawaddy moist deciduous forests The Irrawaddy moist deciduous forests is a tropical moist broadleaf forest ecoregion in central Myanmar. The ecoregion occupies the central basin of the Irrawaddy River and the lower basin of the Salween River. The ecoregion is characterized by f ...

lie inland to the north, while the Irrawaddy freshwater swamp forests occupy the wide Irrawaddy Delta to the south. Further east, the Kayah–Karen montane rain forests and Tenasserim–South Thailand semi-evergreen rain forests cover the eastern mountains, and another enclave of the Irrawaddy moist deciduous forests lies in the lower Salween basin. The

Myanmar Coast mangroves The Burmese or Myanmar Coast mangroves are an ecoregion in Burma, Malaysia, Thailand and Bangladesh where there were once thick forests of mangroves but today most has been cleared, resulting in loss of habitat for wildlife. Location and descript ...

fringe the coast and river estuaries.Wikramanayake, Eric; Eric Dinerstein; Colby J. Loucks; et al. (2002). ''Terrestrial Ecoregions of the Indo-Pacific: a Conservation Assessment.'' Washington, DC: Island Press.

Climate

The climate is humid and tropical. Rainfall is highest during the summer, when

Southwest monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal oscill ...

brings moisture-laden air from the

Flora

The forests are mostly made up of evergreen trees, or semi-evergreen trees which drop some of their leaves during the dry season.

Dipterocarp Dipterocarpaceae is a family of 16 genera and about 695 known species of mainly tropical lowland rainforest trees. The family name, from the type genus ''Dipterocarpus'', is derived from Greek (''di'' = two, ''pteron'' = wing and ''karpos'' = fru ...

s are the predominant trees, and common dipterocarps include ''

Dipterocarpus alatus ''Dipterocarpus alatus'' ( th, ยางนา, , ; Khmer: ''chhë tiël ba:y, chhë tiël tük, chhë tiël thom''DY PHON Pauline, 2000, Plants Used In Cambodia, self-published, printed by Imprimerie Olympic, Phnom Penh or ឈើទាល (''c ...

, D. turbinatus, D. obtusifolius,

Anisoptera glabra ''Anisoptera scaphula'' is a species of plant in the family Dipterocarpaceae. It is native to Bangladesh, Peninsular Malaysia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand. Description ''Anisoptera scaphula'' is a tall tree, reaching a height of and a girth of . ...

Hopea odorata ''Hopea odorata'', or ta-khian ( th, ตะเคียน), is a species of plant in the family Dipterocarpaceae. It is found in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. It is a large tree reaching up to 45 ...

'', and ''

Parashorea stellata ''Parashorea stellata'' (also called white seraya) is a species of tree in the family Dipterocarpaceae. It grows naturally in Laos, Peninsular Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. It is threatened by habitat loss Habitat destruction (a ...

''. Other trees include ''

Swintonia floribunda ''Swintonia floribunda'' is a tree species in the family Anacardiaceae. It can be found in the Andaman Islands, Indo-China and Malesia through to Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest islan ...

, Pentace burmanica,

Lagerstroemia calyculata ''Lagerstroemia calyculata'' known as the "Guava Crape Myrtle" (Vietnamese name : ''Bằng Lăng Ổi'', ''Bằng Lăng Cườm''; th, ตะแบก ''tabaek''; Cambodian name: Srolao "ដើមស្រឡៅ"); the name is derived from its v ...

, L. floribunda'', and '' L. speciosa''. Understory plants include ''Calamus'' palms and the creeping bamboo ''

Neohouzeaua helferi ''Neohouzeaua'' is a genus of Asian bamboo within the grass family).tiger The tiger (''Panthera tigris'') is the largest living cat species and a member of the genus '' Panthera''. It is most recognisable for its dark vertical stripes on orange fur with a white underside. An apex predator, it primarily preys on ...

(''Panthera tigris''),

Asian elephant The Asian elephant (''Elephas maximus''), also known as the Asiatic elephant, is the only living species of the genus '' Elephas'' and is distributed throughout the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, from India in the west, Nepal in ...

(''Elephas maximus''),

Malayan tapir The Malayan tapir (''Tapirus indicus''), also called Asian tapir, Asiatic tapir and Indian tapir, is the only tapir species native to Southeast Asia from the Malay Peninsula to Sumatra. It has been listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List si ...

(''Tapirus indicus''),

dhole The dhole (''Cuon alpinus''; ) is a canid native to Central, South, East and Southeast Asia. Other English names for the species include Asian wild dog, Asiatic wild dog, Indian wild dog, whistling dog, red dog, red wolf, and mountain wolf. ...

(''Cuon alpinus''),

sun bear The sun bear (''Helarctos malayanus'') is a species in the family Ursidae (the only species in the genus ''Helarctos'') occurring in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia. It is the smallest bear, standing nearly at the shoulder and weighin ...

(''Ursus malayanus''),

clouded leopard The clouded leopard (''Neofelis nebulosa''), also called the mainland clouded leopard, is a wild cat inhabiting dense forests from the foothills of the Himalayas through mainland Southeast Asia into South China. In the early 19th century, a ...

(''Pardofelis nebulosa''),

leopard The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus '' Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia ...

(''Panthera pardus''), Asian golden cat (''Catopuma temmincki''), and

gaur The gaur (''Bos gaurus''; ), also known as the Indian bison, is a bovine native to South Asia and Southeast Asia, and has been listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List since 1986. The global population was estimated at a maximum of 21,000 ...

(''Bos gaurus''). Habitat loss and poaching have made large mammals scarce. The

Sumatran rhinoceros The Sumatran rhinoceros (''Dicerorhinus sumatrensis''), also known as the Sumatran rhino, hairy rhinoceros or Asian two-horned rhinoceros, is a rare member of the family Rhinocerotidae and one of five extant species of rhinoceros. It is the o ...

(''Dicerorhinus sumatrensis'') was once native to the ecoregion, but Myanmar's last rhinoceros was killed in 1984. The Burma pipistrelle (''Hypsugo lophurus'') is an endemic bat, and the disc-footed bat (''Eudiscopus denticulus'') is a near-endemic. Over 350 species of birds live in the ecoregion.

Protected areas

A 2017 assessment found that 3,534 km², or 6%, of the ecoregion is in protected areas. About half the unprotected area is still forested.

External links

References

{{reflist Ecoregions of Myanmar * Indomalayan ecoregions Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests