North of the Rio San Juan, southeast Nicaragua Photograph by Jan Schipper   Central America: Panama, Costa Rica, and southern Nicaragua Tropical and Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests   34,600 square miles (89,500 square kilometers) -- slightly smaller than Indiana Vulnerable

· True Tropical Jungles
· Special Features
· Did You Know?
· Wild Side
· Cause for Concern
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True Tropical Jungles

When you think "tropical jungle," perhaps you imagine humid air and thick forests, alive with creatures from the dense green floor to the towering canopy. The Central American Atlantic Moist Forests ecoregion fits this description, with huge buttressed trees, brilliant flowers, armies of insects, and a diversity of wild animals. This ecoregion is definitely an important center for biodiversity.

Special Features

Because of its location on the isthmus of Central America, this ecoregion contains a mixture of both North and South American plants and animals. The ecoregion is made up of lush, tall forests of trees reaching over 150 feet (50 m) in height, with a diversity of palms and other smaller trees in the understory. The Caribbean slope is a major route for birds migrating both between North and South America and between lowland and montane forests.

	Tent-building bats have found a clever way to stay dry in the wet forests of Central America. One of only two kinds of bats that create shelters, these bats chew on large palm leaves until they fold with their ends hanging downward to form tents that keep the bats dry and safe underneath.

Wild Side

Here, the roaring calls of howler monkeys fill the morning air, as ocelots prowl and Baird’s tapirs wade through nearby swamps. Green macaws squawk at approaching coati from their nests atop giant almendro trees, while brilliant blue flashes mark the flight paths of morpho butterflies along meandering rivers. Groups of tent-building bats huddle under palm leaves as troops of spider monkeys swing through the branches of riverside gavilán trees. A boat-billed heron seeks refuge on the frond of a raffia palm, and bright white flowers fall from a pachira tree into the water. These flowers bloom at night and are pollinated by nocturnal sphinx moths and bats. Along the coast, the largest green sea turtle rookery in the Northern Hemisphere attracts a variety of predators that come to feed on the small sea turtle hatchlings. These include ocelots, black vultures, army ants, sharks, and ghost crabs.

Cause for Concern

The once-vast Atlantic lowland forests have been seriously fragmented in recent years. Lowland areas have been converted to banana plantations, while areas on drier ground are dominated by cattle-farming, logging operations, and agriculture. Other threats include urban sprawl, road construction, illegal settlements, and hunting.

For more information on this ecoregion, go to the World Wildlife Fund Scientific Report.