WWF (World Wildlife Fund) ecologists currently divide the land surface of the Earth into 8 major ecozones containing 867 smaller terrestrial ecoregions (see list).
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Ecozone boundaries generally follow continental boundaries, or major barriers to plant and animal distribution, like the Himalayas and the Sahara.
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In this context, terrestrial is used to mean "of land" (soil and rock), rather than the more general sense "of Earth" (which includes land and oceans).
The rare Mountain Gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei) survives only in this ecoregion as do L'Hoest's Monkey and a sub-species of Hamlyn's Monkey as well as many species of butterflies, and birds including Grauer's Warblers, Chapin's Flycatchers, and the Ruwenzori Turaco.
The Baffin coastal tundra is a small ecoregion of the far north of North America, on the central north coast of Baffin Island in the Canadian territory of Nunavut.
Several species of deciduous oaks (most prominently Quercus frainetto Ten., as well as Q. cerris L., Q. pubescens Willd. and others) dominate most of the ecoregion's forests, interspersed higher up mountainsides (above 800–1200 m) mostly with European Beech and such conifers as Scots Pine, Macedonian Pine, Silver Fir and Norway Spruce.
Chusquea bamboo is an indicator species of the ecoregion.
California oak woodlands — native oaks centered plant community within the California chaparral and woodlands ecoregion.
Three endemic or near-endemic birds found in the ecoregion are the White-chested Swift (Cypseloides lemosi), Grayish Piculet (Picumnus granadensis), Apical Flycatcher (Myiarchus apicalis).
No substantial areas of original grassland remain in this ecoregion, only fragmented remnants but prairie restoration is happening, for example, at Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge in Jasper County, Iowa.
The ecoregion is rich in wildlife with many endemic species of birds, and some mammals, while endemic amphibians include five species of reed frogs (Hyperolius), two species of forest treefrogs (Leptopelis), five tree toads (Nectophrynoides), four species of Microhylidae, and five Caeciliidae.
Eremolaena rotundifolia, known by the vernacular names Amaninombilahy fotsy, Anjananjana, Fotona, Fotonala, Fotonalahy, Menahy lahy, Takodizahana lahy and Voantalanina, is native to littoral (seaside) forests on sand at Masoala National Park and in the Fort Dauphin area, in the Madagascar lowland forests ecoregion.
On Ecuador's side of the mangrove ecoregion, particularly near the cities of Machala and Santa Rosa in the province of El Oro, many shrimp farm ponds have been dug out for export of shrimp to the U.S., Europe and other regions.
These plants are mainly located in the spacious forests from three places of Ancash: the gully of Ingenio in Catac, the punas of Cajamarquilla and the gully of Qishqi, also in Catac.
The Louisiade Archipelago rain forests form a distinct ecoregion, and are home to a number of endemic species, including several endemic trees (in genera Pandanus, Diospyros, and Hopea), as well as five endemic frog species, two endemic lizard species, and five endemic bird species.
This ecoregion extends from south of the Great Slave Lake in the Northwest Territories through most of northeastern Alberta, central Saskatchewan and parts of west-central Manitoba and consists of three main areas: the Slave River basin in northeastern Alberta, the lowlands of the northern Manitoba plain, and the uplands south of the Canadian Shield from north-central Alberta to southwestern Manitoba.
About 5% of the ecoregion lies within protected areas, the largest of which are Melghat Tiger Reserve and Noradehi Sanctuary while others include Bandhavgarh, Panna, and Sanjay national parks.
Po Basin mixed forests is an ecoregion and biome composed of trees and other vegetation characteristically found in the temperate broadleaf and mixed forests surrounding the Po River in Northern Italy, and its watershed from the Cisalpine, or Italian side, of the Alps.
Prosopis nigra (synonym Prosopis algarrobilla) is a South American leguminous tree species that inhabits the Gran Chaco ecoregion (in particular, the transition zone between the Wet Chaco and the Southern Chaco), in Argentina and Paraguay.
The species within this genus inhabit different regions of the Gran Chaco ecoregion including parts of northern Argentina, Bolivia, and Paraguay.
It includes the tropical ocean waters surrounding most of the Solomon Islands (excluding the Santa Cruz Islands, which are part of the Vanuatu marine ecoregion), and the waters surrounding the Bougainville, Buka, and Tabar Islands of Papua New Guinea.
Tamaulipan mezquital an ecoregion in the southern United States and northeastern Mexico
WWF has classified this reserve as part of the larger ecoregion of the South Saharan Steppe and Woodlands ecoregion that includes a strip of desert land which extends from central Mauritania, Mali, southwestern Algeria, Niger, Chad, and across Sudan to the Red Sea, and borders southern fringes of the Sahara Desert.
Like the rest of the country, the islands are in the Vanuatu rain forests ecoregion.
The ecoregion includes several island groups lying east of the eastern peninsula of the island of New Guinea, including the D'Entrecasteaux Islands, Trobriand Islands, and Woodlark Island.
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The Trobriand Islands rain forests are a tropical moist broadleaf forest ecoregion of Papua New Guinea.
Rancho Nuevo beach in Tamaulipas is the only nesting site in the world for the Kemp's Ridley sea turtle (Lepidochelys kempii) while other herpetofauna of the ecoregion include Río Grande Chirping Frog (Eleutherodactylus cystignathoides) and Mexican White-lipped Frog (Leptodactylus fragilis).
As this area approaches the tropics, fauna differs from the rest of the coast, so that animals like the boas, larger reptiles and the famous White-winged Guan (a bird species unique to this Peruvian ecoregion) occur here.