Little Caucasus, Georgia Photograph by WWF/ Hartmut Jungius   Western Asia: Georgia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Armenia Temperate Broadleaf and Mixed Forests   65,800 square miles (170,300 square kilometers) -- about the size of Washington Critical/Endangered

· A Biological Crossroads
· Special Features
· Did You Know?
· Wild Side
· Cause for Concern
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A Biological Crossroads

If you were to travel to the Caucasus Mixed Forests, you'd find yourself near the borders of eight other distinct ecoregions and at the crossroads of three major biogeographic provinces. In simple terms, that means this ecoregion contains a mixture of species from Central/Northern Europe, from Central Asia, and from the Middle East/North Africa. It also contains a remarkable number of endemic species, including more than 1,500 plants. Visit the region and you may encounter creatures with such unusual names as Caucasian turs, lammergeiers, and Caucasian parsley-frogs!

Special Features

The climate of the Caucasus Mixed Forests is temperate, but if you climbed up the mountains here you'd notice significant changes from one elevation to the next. Temperate mixed forests cover most of the region, dominated by Georgian oak, ash, hornbeam and other broadleaf species. At the higher elevations grow coniferous forests with fir, spruce, and pines. Above the tree line you'd find grassy meadows alternating with thickets of rhododendron and patches of rocky scree.

	The lammergeier is a huge eaglelike vulture that gets some of its food by dropping the bones of dead animals from great heights, which cracks the bones and allows access to the marrow inside.

Wild Side

More than 10,000 plants, 700 vertebrates, and 20,000 invertebrates have been catalogued in the Caucasus Mixed Forests. Wild goats graze on grasses. Lynxes hunt small mammals and other prey. Brown bears feast on berries. And Caucasian salamanders scramble over rocks and logs. A number of bird species also inhabit this region, including Caucasian black grouse, Caucasian snowcocks, and Guldenstadts' redstarts.

Cause for Concern

Most of the lowland forest in this region has been converted for agriculture or human developments. At higher elevations, overgrazing is causing some habitat degradation, and commercial forestry looms as a potential threat.

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