| Cook Inlet taiga | |
|---|---|
 Taiga forest in the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge | |
 Map of the Cook Inlet taiga | |
| Ecology | |
| Realm | Nearctic |
| Biome | Boreal forests/taiga |
| Borders | |
| Geography | |
| Area | 27,790 km2 (10,730 sq mi) |
| Country | United States |
| State | Alaska |
| Climate type | Subarctic (Dfc) |
| Conservation | |
| Conservation status | Relatively stable/intact [1] |
| Protected | 8,439 km² (30%) [2] |
The Cook Inlet taiga is a taiga and boreal forests ecoregion in Alaska.
This ecoregion is located around the upper Cook Inlet on the south-central coast of Alaska, sheltered by mountains on all sides. This coast has a gentle landscape and a relatively mild climate for Alaska with 380–680 mm of rainfall per year. [1]
The plant life here is varied for Alaska, composted of a mixture of conifers and other trees, shrubs, and herbs. The dominant trees in this region are black spruce (Picea mariana), white spruce (Picea glauca), lutz spruce (Picea x lutzii), quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides), balsam poplar (Populus balsamifera), black cottonwood (Populus trichocarpa) and paper birch (Betula papyrifera). The spruce forest is regularly renewed following severe damage by spruce bark beetle infestations.
This area is rich in wildlife including grey wolves, bears and Canada lynx. The Kenai River is home to five species of Pacific salmon, including the largest chinook salmon in the world. Birds include large numbers of bald eagles and wintering snow geese from Wrangell Island, who gather at the mouth of the Kenai River before their spring migration.
The Kenai River, Anchorage, Palmer and Wasilla areas are the most populated part of Alaska, and a base for both the logging and oil and gas industries on the Kenai Peninsula. There is also some clearance for farming in Palmer and Point MacKenzie. Nonetheless, natural habitats remain very well preserved, although wildlife of the Kenai Peninsula has become isolated from that of the Matanuska-Susitna Valley and the west side of Cook Inlet, and therefore from the rest of Alaska. Protected areas include Kenai National Wildlife Refuge, Chugach State Park, Nancy Lake State Recreation Area and the Susitna Flats.
Kenai Peninsula Borough is a borough of the U.S. state of Alaska. As of the 2020 census, the population was 58,799, up from 55,400 in 2010. The borough seat is Soldotna, the largest city is Kenai, and the most populated community is the census-designated place of Kalifornsky.
The Pacific temperate rainforests of western North America is the largest temperate rain forest region on the planet as defined by the World Wildlife Fund. The Pacific temperate rainforests lie along the western side of the Pacific Coast Ranges along the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America from the Prince William Sound in Alaska through the British Columbia Coast to Northern California, and are part of the Nearctic realm, as also defined by the World Wildlife Fund. The Pacific temperate rain forests are characterized by a high amount of rainfall, in some areas more than 300 cm (10 ft) per year and moderate temperatures in both the summer and winter months.
The Northern Pacific coastal forests are temperate coniferous forest ecoregion of the Pacific coast of North America. It occupies a narrow coastal zone of Alaska, between the Pacific Ocean and the northernmost Pacific Coast Ranges, covering an area of 23,300 square miles, extending from the Alexander Archipelago in southeast Alaska along the Gulf of Alaska to the western Kenai Peninsula and eastern Kodiak Island. The Pacific Coastal Mountain icefields and tundra ecoregion lies inland, at higher elevations in the Coast Mountains. The ecoregion receives high rainfall, which varies considerably based on exposure and elevation. It contains a quarter of the world's remaining temperate rain forest.
The Kenai National Wildlife Refuge is a 1.92-million-acre (7,770 km2) wildlife habitat preserve located on the Kenai Peninsula of Alaska, United States. It is adjacent to Kenai Fjords National Park. This refuge was created in 1941 as the Kenai National Moose Range, but in 1980 it was changed to its present status by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. The refuge is administered from offices in Soldotna.
The Cascade Mountains leeward forests are a temperate coniferous forest ecoregion of North America, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Gulf of St. Lawrence lowland forests are a temperate broadleaf and mixed forest ecoregion of Eastern Canada, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Alberta–British Columbia foothills forests are a temperate coniferous forests ecoregion of Western Canada, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system. This ecoregion borders Canada's taiga and contains a mix of subarctic forest and temperate forest species as a result. This makes the region an ecotone region, or a region that acts as a buffer between two other biomes.
The Alaska Peninsula montane taiga is a taiga and boreal forests ecoregion, located in Alaska, and defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Copper Plateau taiga is an ecoregion of North America, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system and the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, in the Taiga and Boreal forests, Biome, Alaska.
The Eastern Canadian Boreal Forests is a boreal ecoregion in Eastern Canada, defined by the One Earth ecoregion categorization system.
The Eastern Canadian Shield taiga is an ecoregion of Canada as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Yukon Interior dry forests is a taiga ecoregion of Canada.
The Muskwa-Slave Lake Taiga ecoregion covers Canadian taiga in northwestern Alberta, northeastern British Columbia and a large portion of the southwestern Northwest Territories around the Mackenzie River valley and the Great Slave Lake.
The interior Alaska–Yukon lowland taiga is an ecoregion in the taiga and boreal forests biome, of far northern North America.
The Mid-Canada Boreal Plains Forests is a taiga ecoregion of Western Canada, designated by One Earth. It was previously defined as the Mid-Continental Canadian Forests by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system, before it was modified by One Earth, the successor to WWF.
The Midwest Canadian Shield Forests is an ecoregion in Canada, classified as a Taiga and Boreal Forests Biome.
The Central Canadian Shield forests are a taiga ecoregion of Eastern Canada, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Beringia upland tundra is a mountainous tundra ecoregion of North America, on the west coast of Alaska.
Pacific Coastal Mountain icefields and tundra is a tundra ecoregion in Alaska, British Columbia, and Yukon, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The Northwest Territories taiga ecoregion (WWF:NA0614) is located in the Northwest Territories and Yukon provinces of Canada. It covers forest and tundra along the Mackenzie River Valley and the surrounding highlands in the southern portion of the valley.
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link) Supplemental material 2 table S1b.