Rainforests and vine thickets are a major vegetation group in Australia. It consists of temperate to tropical rainforests, monsoon forests, and vine thickets. Rainforests and vine thickets are generally found in small pockets across the eastern and northern portions of the continent, including western Tasmania, eastern New South Wales, eastern Queensland, the northern portion of the Northern Territory, and the Kimberley Region of northeastern Western Australia.[1]
Rainforests and vine thickets have a present extent of 36,469km2, of which 22,694km2 is in protected areas.[1]
Rainforests and vine thickets are present in 36 of Australia's bioregions. The largest extent of rainforest in Australia is in the Queensland tropical rain forests ecoregion (Wet Tropics bioregion). The estimated pre-1750 extent is 50,743km2. Prior to 1750, the largest area of rainforest and vine thicket was in the South Eastern Queensland bioregion, which is part of the Eastern Australian temperate forests ecoregion.[1]
are closed-canopy forests, generally with 70% or greater foliage cover.
are characterised by trees with dense, horizontally or obliquely-held foliage in the upper layers.
are described in terms of leaf size:
mesophyll – more than 12.5cm long (45 – 100cm2), e.g. tropical rainforest
notophyll – 7.5 - 12.5cm long (2 – 45cm2), e.g. warm temperate rainforest
microphyll – less than 7.5cm long (2.5 – 20cm2), e.g. cloud forest.
are high in plant-species diversity, which declines with increasing latitude and elevation.
are ‘taxonomically-deep’ in biodiversity, with diverse representation of genera, families and orders.
are home to plants that regenerate in low light conditions, typically in canopy gaps.
have a species composition that varies between successional stages following different kinds of disturbance.
are rarely fire-prone. Regular or intense wildfires can destroy the dense moisture-conserving forest cover, which many rainforest and vine thicket species depend on to regenerate and thrive. Where human activity and/or climatic change increase the frequency or intensity of fires, rainforests may be replaced with more fire-tolerant plant communities like sclerophyll forest or woodland.
may have emergent eucalypts present within its margins or throughout, depending on disturbance history.
vines, epiphytes and mosses are a conspicuous and important element of their structure in tropical and subtropical rainforests. In temperate rainforests epiphytes are less abundant and primarily cryptogams.
Rainforests and vine thickets cover a wide geographic range along the eastern fringe of the continent and across the north, and are absent from central and western Australia.[1]
They occur in cool temperate, warm temperate, subtropical, and tropical areas in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania and as small patches in north coastal Northern Territory and the Kimberley region in Western Australia.[1]
Rain forests and vine thickets occur from sea level up to 1500 metres elevation, mostly within 100km of the coast. Outliers of vine thicket extend further inland.[1]
They are mostly confined to wetter areas or climatic refuges in eastern and northern Australia receiving more than 1200mm of rainfall annually, but vine scrub and dry rainforest may occur in small patches where average annual rainfall is as low as 600 – 900mm.[1]
At the drier end of the rainfall range, rainforests and vine thickets are typically confined to topographically sheltered sites.[1]
Rainforests and vine thickets grow on a range of substrates, including volcanic to sedimentary substrates, alluvial plains, and coastal sand sheets, with moderate to high levels of soil nutrients. Soils can exert a strict control on location and structure within a climatic zone. The influence of soil substrates is muted at the extremes of the tropical-monsoonal dry type and the cool-temperate wet type.[1]
Rainforest communities
Major rainforest and vine thicket communities include cool temperate rainforest, tropical or sub-tropical rainforest, warm temperate rainforest, dry rainforest or vine thickets. They can be structured as closed forest (low, mid, and tall), closed fernland (low and mid), closed palmland (low and mid), closed vineland (low and mid), and closed shrubland (tall).[1]
Australia's largest remaining tropical rainforest area is in the Wet Tropics bioregion of northern Queensland, covering more than 20,000km2. Tropical rainforests which have been extensively cleared include the Atherton Tableland and Eungella Plateau, and coastal Wet Tropics floodplains of Daintree, Barron, Johnstone, Tully–Murray, Herbert, Proserpine and Pioneer River, and tropical lowlands from Cairns to Cooktown.[1]
Semi-deciduous monsoon forest
Monsoon forests grow in tropical areas of northern Australia with a pronounced dry season. They are tyically semi-deciduous, with many canopy trees losing their leaves during the dry season, and becoming 'raingreen' during the rainy monsoon season. They tend to have a lower canopy than evergreen rain forests, and are rich in woody lianas and herbaceous epiphytes.[2] Isolated patches of semi-deciduous monsoon forest occur across tropical northern Australia, including the Northern Territory's Top End and the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Habitats are diverse, including sandstone gorges and rock outcrops, lowland springs and stream margins, coastal beach ridges, and lateritic formations.[1] Patches are from 10 to 100 km2 in size in the Arnhem Land tropical savanna ecoregion of the northern Top End, and generally smaller than 10 km2 across the Kimberley, Victoria Plains, and Carpentaria ecoregions further south. They are typically surrounded by flammable Eucalyptus/Corymbia open woodlands and savannas. The Kimberley region has over 1,500 patches of monsoon rainforest totaling 7,000 hectares. Patches average less than four hectares in area, with about 3% greater than 20 ha and the largest at 200 ha.[2]
Littoral rainforest
Littoral rainforest is scattered along the coast in areas influenced by moist maritime winds, and include elements of tropical and subtropical or warm temperate rainforest. Typical littoral rainforest genera include Pisonia, Cupaniopsis, and Euroschinus.[1]
The mountain frog (Philoria kundagungan) is a subtropical rainforest endemic which dwells in rainforest enclaves in south-east Queensland and north-eastern New South Wales.[4]
Semi-deciduous vine thicket
Semi-deciduous vine thicket, also known as semi-evergreen vine thicket, communities occur in drier environments, like the Brigalow Belt on the western slopes of the Great Dividing Range in south-central Queensland and north-central New South Wales. Monsoonal vine thickets are found on the eastern coast in the transitional zone between the coast and semi-arid areas, and in the seasonal tropics of northern Australia.[1] Vine thickets grow in dune swales in the Dampier Peninsula of Western Australia's Kimberley region, and are sustained by groundwater from the Broome aquifer and coastal fog during the dry season.[2] Characteristic genera include Brachychiton, Cassine, Flindersia, Alectryon, Alphitonia, Aphanopetalum, Backhousia, Diospyros, Claoxylon, Clerodendrum, Mallotus, Wilkiea, Celastrus, Pyrrosia, and Pellaea. Extensive areas of vine thickets have been substantially cleared for agriculture and grazing, including the softwood scrubs in the Brigalow Belt.[1]
Cool temperate rainforest
Cool temperate rainforests include both deciduous and evergreen forests, typically beech forests dominated by only one or two canopy species at high latitudes and elevations. The most extensive cool temperate rainforests are the Tasmanian temperate rainforests of western Tasmania, particularly in the north-west.[1] Smaller areas are also found in favourable higher-elevation sites in eastern Victoria and a few small climatic refuges along the Great Dividing Range as far north as the McPherson Range of south-east Queensland.[1] There are an estimated 545,000 ha in Tasmania, 3,000 ha in Victoria, and 15,000 ha in New South Wales.[5]
Rainforests are forests characterized by a closed and continuous tree canopy, moisture-dependent vegetation, the presence of epiphytes and lianas and the absence of wildfire. Rainforests can be generally classified as tropical rainforests or temperate rainforests, but other types have been described.
The tropics are the regions of Earth surrounding the Equator. They are defined in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern Hemisphere at 23°26′10.5″ (or 23.43624°) N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere at 23°26′10.5″ (or 23.43624°) S. The tropics are also referred to as the tropical zone and the torrid zone.
Eubenangee Swamp is a national park in Eubenangee in the Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia, 1332 km northwest of Brisbane. It is part of the Coastal Wet Tropics Important Bird Area, identified as such by BirdLife International because of its importance for the conservation of lowland tropical rainforest birds. It plays home to over 190 species of birds.
The Global 200 is the list of ecoregions identified by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), the global conservation organization, as priorities for conservation. According to WWF, an ecoregion is defined as a "relatively large unit of land or water containing a characteristic set of natural communities that share a large majority of their species dynamics, and environmental conditions". For example, based on their levels of endemism, Madagascar gets multiple listings, ancient Lake Baikal gets one, and the North American Great Lakes get none.
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.
The Queensland tropical rain forests ecoregion covers a portion of the coast of Queensland in northeastern Australia and belongs to the Australasian realm. The forest contains the world's best living record of the major stages in the evolutionary history of the world's land plants, including most of the world's relict species of plants from the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana. The history of the evolution of marsupials and songbirds is also well represented.
Temperate rainforests are rainforests with coniferous or broadleaf forests that occur in the temperate zone and receive heavy rain.
Mount Bartle Frere is the highest mountain in Queensland at an elevation of 1,611 metres (5,285 ft). The mountain was named after Sir Henry Bartle Frere, a British colonial administrator and then president of the Royal Geographical Society by George Elphinstone Dalrymple in 1873. Bartle Frere was British Governor of Cape Colony at the outset of the Anglo-Zulu War.
Laurel forest, also called laurisilva or laurissilva, is a type of subtropical forest found in areas with high humidity and relatively stable, mild temperatures. The forest is characterized by broadleaf tree species with evergreen, glossy and elongated leaves, known as "laurophyll" or "lauroid". Plants from the laurel family (Lauraceae) may or may not be present, depending on the location.
Mabi forests are a type of ecological community found in the Australian state of Queensland which is considered to be critically endangered and which consists of remnant patches found only either in North Queensland's Atherton Tablelands or at Shiptons Flat along the Annan River.
The Eastern Australian temperate forests is a broad ecoregion of open forest on uplands starting from the east coast of New South Wales in the South Coast to southern Queensland, Australia. Although dry sclerophyll and wet sclerophyll eucalyptus forests predominate within this ecoregion, a number of distinguishable rainforest communities are present as well.
The Arnhem Land tropical savanna is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands ecoregion in Australia's Northern Territory.
The Kimberley tropical savanna is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands ecoregion in northwestern Australia, covering portions of Western Australia and the Northern Territory south of the Timor Sea.
The Victoria Plains tropical savanna is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands ecoregion in northwestern Australia.
The Littoral Rainforests of New South Wales is a group of fragmented and endangered ecological communities found by the coast in eastern Australia. Much of this seaside form has been destroyed by mining, tourist development or housing. It is threatened by extinction in the near future. 90% of the 433 sites are less than ten hectares in size. Littoral rainforest amounts to 0.6% of the rainforests in New South Wales.
Seasonal tropical forest, also known as moist deciduous, semi-evergreen seasonal, tropical mixed or monsoon forests, typically contain a range of tree species: only some of which drop some or all of their leaves during the dry season. This tropical forest is classified under the Walter system as (i) tropical climate with high overall rainfall and (ii) having a very distinct wet season with dry season. These forests represent a range of habitats influenced by monsoon (Am) or tropical wet savannah (Aw) climates. Drier forests in the Aw climate zone are typically deciduous and placed in the Tropical dry forest biome: with further transitional zones (ecotones) of savannah woodland then tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands.
Tully Training Area is a heritage-listed rainforest in a military training area at Tully-Cardstone Road, Tully, Queensland, Australia. It was added to the Australian Commonwealth Heritage List on 22 June 2004.
1 2 3 Kenneally, K. F. (2018). Kimberley Tropical Monsoon Rainforests of Western Australia: Perspectives on Biological Diversity. Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas, 12(1), 149–228. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44858922
↑ "Littoral rainforests and coastal vine thickets of eastern Australia". Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) policy statement – Nationally threatened species and ecological communities guidelines. Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts, Australian Government. March 2009. Retrieved 20 June 2023.
↑ Bolitho, L. J., Rowley, J. J. L., Hines, H. B., & Newell, D. (2019). Occupancy modelling reveals a highly restricted and fragmented distribution in a threatened montane frog (Philoria kundagungan) in subtropical Australian rainforests. Australian Journal of Zoology, 67(4), 231–240. https://doi.org/10.1071/ZO20037
1 2 Cool Temperate Rainforest. Australian Forest Profiles 1997. National Forest Inventory, Government of Australia,
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