Northeastern coastal forests


The Northeastern coastal forests are a temperate broadleaf and mixed forests ecoregion of the northeast and middle Atlantic region of the United States. The ecoregion covers an area of 34,630 sq miles encompassing the Piedmont and coastal plain of seven states, extending from coastal southwestern Maine, southeastern New Hampshire, eastern Massachusetts, and Rhode Island, southward through Connecticut, New York State, New Jersey, southeast Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland.
The ecoregion is bounded on the east by the Atlantic Ocean. To the north, it transitions to the New England-Acadian forests, which cover most of northern and inland New England. To the west, the ecoregion transitions to Allegheny Highlands forests and the Appalachian-Blue Ridge forests of the Appalachian Mountains. To the south lie the Southeastern mixed forests and the Middle Atlantic coastal forests. The ecoregion surrounds the distinct Atlantic coastal pine barrens ecoregion, which covers portions of New Jersey, Long Island and Cape Cod in southeastern Massachusetts.

Climate

The climate in this ecoregion is the broad transition from the humid continental in the north to the humid subtropical climate in the south.

Flora

forests dominate this ecoregion. American chestnut was formerly important, but its population was devastated by the chestnut blight early in the 20th century.

Dry-mesic oak forests

s are found throughout this ecoregion. They cover large areas at low and middle elevations, typically on flat to gently rolling terrain. Red oak, white oak, and black oak are common oaks in this habitat. Other trees include hickories, red maple, sugar maple, white ash, tulip tree, American beech, black cherry, black birch, black tupelo, and American elm. Flowering dogwood is a common understory tree.
common shrubs are maple-leaved viburnum, spicebush, and witch hazel. In sandier or more acidic soils are mountain laurel, blueberry, huckleberry, and swamp azalea.
Mayapple is a common herbaceous plant.

Hemlock-northern hardwood forests

s occur in deep coves, moist flats, and ravines. They include sugar maple, yellow birch, and beech. These trees often form a deciduous canopy, but are sometimes mixed with hemlock or white pine. Other common trees include oaks, tuliptree, black cherry, and sweet birch. In the Northeast, red spruce can be a minor canopy associate. Hophornbeam is frequent but not dominant.

Dry oak-pine forests

s occur on dry sites with loamy to sandy soils. A mix of oak and pine tree species dominate the canopy, typically chestnut oak, Virginia pine, and white pine, but sometimes white oak or scarlet oak. Varying amounts of oaks and pines result in oak forests, mixed oak-pine forests, or small pine forests. Shrubs such as hillside blueberry, black huckleberry, and mountain laurel are common in the understory and can form a dense layer.

Pine-oak rocky woodlands

s occur on lower-elevation hilltops, outcrops, and rocky slopes and have a patchy or open aspect. Pitch pine and Virginia pine are common within their respective ranges. These pines are often mixed with dry-site oaks such as chestnut oak, bear oak, northern red oak, and scarlet oak. Sprouts of chestnut can also be found. In the northeast, eastern red-cedar or hophornbeam are sometimes important. In the understory, some areas have a fairly well-developed heath shrub layer, others a graminoid layer, the latter particularly common under deciduous trees such as oaks.

Successional plant communities

These occur in formerly cleared land, such as old farms, that has been abandoned. Eastern red cedar are some of the first trees to occupy these lands.

Freshwater wetlands

Marshes occur where standing water is present for most of the year. Common reed and cattails are often abundant.
Swamps and floodplains occur where standing water is present for only some parts of the year. Red maple is common tree, and can be found with swamp tupelo, white ash, American elm, pin oak, swamp white oak, and silver maple. Spicebush is a common shrub. Skunk cabbage is found here.

Fauna

Some of the animals that live in the Northeastern coastal deciduous forests are white-tailed deer, eastern gray squirrels, chipmunks, red foxes, sparrows, chickadees, copperheads, rattlesnakes, northern water snakes, box turtles, snapping turtles, garter snakes, snails, coyotes, black bears, beavers, woodchucks and raccoons. Chickadees, white-tailed deer, and eastern gray squirrels can be seen quite often. Gray wolves used to be quite common, but are extirpated, causing endemic growth in deer populations near suburban areas, with eastern coyotes generally taking their place by the mid-20th century.
Moose may also be seen in some of the northernmost regions of the Northeastern coastal forests, though this is very, very rare.

Areas of intact habitat

The following natural areas are within this ecoregion