Bioregion

A bioregion is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a biogeographic realm, but larger than an ecoregion or an ecosystem, in the World Wide Fund for Nature classification scheme. There is also an attempt to use the term in a rank-less generalist sense, similar to the terms "biogeographic area" or "biogeographic unit". It may be conceptually similar to an ecoprovince. It is also differently used in the environmentalist context, being coined by Berg and Dasmann (1977). Global 200 The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) scheme divides some of the biogeographic realms into bioregions, defined as "geographic clusters of ecoregions that may span several habitat types, but have strong biogeographic affinities, particularly at taxonomic levels higher than the species level (genus, family)." The WWF bioregions are as follows: Afrotropical realm Western Africa and Sahel Central Africa Eastern and Southern Africa Horn of Africa Madagascar–Indian Ocean Antarctic realm Australasian realm Australia New Guinea and Melanesia New Zealand Wallacea Indomalayan realm Indian subcontinent Indochina Sunda Shelf and Philippine Archipelago Nearctic realm Canadian Shield Eastern North America Northern Mexico and Southwestern United States Western North America Neotropical realm Amazonia Caribbean Central America Central Andes Eastern South America Everglades Northern Andes Orinoco Southern South America Oceanian realm Micronesia Polynesia Palearctic realm Asia East Asia north of the Himalayan system's foothills to the Arctic Himalayan Tibetan Plateau steppe Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau Northeast Asia Russian Far East Central Asia – Iranian Plateau and north to the Arctic. Temperate Asia biocountry Mongolian Plateau Eurasian Steppe Asian Russia (central) Asian-Siberian region Western Asia Arabian Desert Mediterranean Near East (roughly corresponds to the Levant) Anatolian Plateau Transcaucasia Northern Africa Atlantic coastal desert Sahara Desert Mediterranean Maghreb Atlas montane Europe European Mediterranean Basin