Development of forest Ecozones of Punjab
Development of forest Ecozones of Punjab
Muhammad Afzal, Aqeela Mobeen Akhtar and M. Mahboob-ur-Rahman
ABSTRACT
Intro: Forest Ecozones represent large areas of the Earth's surface where plants developed in relative isolation over long periods of time and are separated from one another by geologic features, such as oceans, broad deserts or high mountain ranges, that formed barriers to plant migration. Forest Ecozones are characterized by the evolutionary history of the plants they contain. These are divisions of the Earth's surface based on plant life form or the adaptation of plants to climatic, soil and other conditions. A tropical moist broadleaf forest in Central America, for example, may be similar to one in New Guinea in its vegetation type and structure, climate, soils, etc., but these forests are inhabited by plants with very different evolutionary histories.
The Punjab province is mainly a fertile region along the river valleys, while sparse deserts can be found near the border with Rajasthan and the Sulaiman Range. The region contains Thar and Cholistan deserts. The Indus River and its many tributaries traverse Punjab from north to south. The landscape is amongst the most heavily irrigated on earth and canals can be found throughout the province. Weather extremes are notable from the hot and barren south to the cool hills of the north. The foothills of the Himalayas are found in the extreme north as well. Most areas in Punjab experience fairly cool winters. By mid-February the temperature begins to rise; springtime weather continues until mid-April, when the summer heat sets in. The spring monsoon has either skipped over the area or has caused it to rain so hard that floods have resulted. June and July are oppressively hot. Although official estimates rarely place the temperature above 46oC, newspaper sources claim that it reaches 51oC and regularly carry reports about people who have succumbed to the heat. Heat records were broken in Multan in June 1993, when the mercury was reported to have risen to 54oC. In August the oppressive heat is punctuated by the rainy season, referred to as barsat, which brings relief in its wake. The hardest part of the summer is then over, but cooler weather does not come until late October.
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