The forests of Mexico cover a surface area of about 64 million hectares, or 34.5% of the country. These forests are categorized by the type of tree and biome: tropical forests, temperate forests, cloud forests, riparian forests, deciduous, evergreen, dry, moist, etc.. The agency in charge of Mexico's forests is the Comisión Nacional Forestal.
History
Forested areas were historically part of indigenous communities' commons for hunting, gathering, and fuel. Areas of Mexico were deforested in the prehispadnic period around Teotihuacan. In the colonial era, forests were a source of timber for construction, for fuel in smelting metals, and for household fuel. Forested lands were included in indigenous community lands in the colonial era. In the late nineteenth century, during the Porfiriato, the national government ignored previous practices of leaving many forested areas in the hands of indigenous communities began implementing forest management policies and unfettered exploitation of woodlands for their timber and water resources. Wood was used for construction and fuel, as well as in the Puebla-Tlaxcala region, for pulp paper. In Chihuahua and in Michoacán and forests were exploited by timber companies. One scholar argues that the change in practice politicized the forested landscape and was an aspect of the commodification of nature, with liberal economic policies undermined collective indigenous rights to land and its resources. Although forests had historically been utilized, the late nineteenth century marked the beginning of industrial-scale exploitation.
Tropical rainforests
Rainforests are found predominantly along the southeastern Atlantic coast, in regions with frequent rain and warm temperatures that allow for plants to retain their foliage year-round. The average rainfall in these forests is above 2,000 mm and temperature is always higher than 18 °C, with little variation.
The Lacandon Jungle is an area of rainforest which stretches from Chiapas into Guatemala and into the southern part of the Yucatán Peninsula. The heart of this rainforest is located in the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve in Chiapas near the border with Guatemala in the Montañas del Oriente region of the state. Although most of the jungle outside the reserve has been partially or completely destroyed and damage continues inside the reserve, the Lacandon is still the largest montane rainforest in North America and one of the last ones left large enough to support jaguars. It contains 1,500 tree species, 33% of all Mexican bird species, 25% of all Mexican animal species, 44% of all Mexican diurnal butterflies and 10% of all Mexico's fish species.
Temperate forests
Mexico is home to 50 species of pine and about 200 species of oak. It is estimated that temperate forests in Mexico contain about 7,000 species of plants.
The Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve contains the over-wintering habitats of the eastern population of the monarch butterfly. The reserve is located in the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt pine-oak forests ecoregion on the border of Michoacán and Mexico State. Millions of butterflies arrive in the preserve annually. Butterflies only inhabit a fraction of the 56,000 hectares of the reserve from October–March. The biosphere's mission is not only to protect the butterfly species, but its habitat as well. The composition of the forest varies with altitude:
Five environmental requirements seem to govern the presence of cloud forests in Mexico: high relative humidity, montane environments, irregular topography, deep litter layer and temperate climate. Cloud forests are found in small areas of 20 states, at altitudes between 600 and 3,100 masl. It is estimated that they are composed of nearly 10% of the plant species in the country of which 30% are unique to these forests. Of these, about 1,300 species are dicots, 700 are monocots, 500 are ferns and 10 are gymnosperms. There are also 800 epiphytes. %-
