• Home
  • About me
  • Contact me
  • Categories
    • Curio Bay – New Zealand’s Jurassic Fossil Forest
    • New Zealand Geology
    • Supernatural
  • Places
    • Australia
    • Armenia
    • Bosnia
    • Brazil
    • Canary Island
    • China
    • Indonesia
    • Turkey
    • Estonia
    • France
    • Georgia
    • Germany
    • Lebanon
    • Mexico
    • Mongolia
    • Kazakhstan
    • Russia
    • Uganda
    • New Zealand
    • India
    • South Africa
MikePole
Travelling to understand time and place

Biogeography & Vegetation

Biogeography and vegetation are concerned with the spatial pattern of life: why particular plant communities occur where they do, how those patterns change across landscapes and regions, and how climate, history, disturbance, and human activity interact to shape them. Any one vegetation is the combined expression of environment (climate, soils, etc), odd things that have happened (contingency), and time.

Posts in this category examine forests, rainforests, wetlands, and other vegetation types from a biogeographic perspective. They draw on field observations, maps, climate data, and published works from different parts of the world. These essays explore it as a dynamic system—structured by climate gradients, geological history, evolutionary legacy, and disturbance regimes.

Many of these pieces sit at the boundary between ecology and geography, asking how present-day vegetation reflects both current environmental conditions and deep historical processes. Topics include the definition and misuse of terms such as “rainforest”, the role of seasonality and extremes.

Together, these posts form a exploration of vegetation as a connected pattern of process, and history, and the modern landscape.

  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    Green Island Bush – Divide and Conquer

    by Mike Pole March 7, 2025
    by Mike Pole March 7, 2025

    Green Island Bush is a prime example of a large patch of New Zealand indigenous forest that was essentially annihilated in the …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    The Lost Ecosystem of the Leith Swamp Forest, Dunedin

    by Mike Pole March 6, 2025
    by Mike Pole March 6, 2025

    One part of Dunedin is different from the rest…. The Dunedin area is an old volcano. It’s formed mostly from the molten, …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    The Ancient Footpath from Otepoti-Dunedin to Moeraki

    by Mike Pole February 27, 2025
    by Mike Pole February 27, 2025

    How old is the oldest cultural feature on Aotearoa-New Zealand? Imagine being around when the only way to get anywhere was to …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    Dunedin’s Ghost-Forests in 1901

    by Mike Pole February 10, 2025
    by Mike Pole February 10, 2025

    When a forest is dead, but somehow still there – either as bleached stumps, and felled, and possibly burnt trunks, I call …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    The Lost Bush of South Dunedin

    by Mike Pole December 13, 2024
    by Mike Pole December 13, 2024

    We owe so much of what we know of early Dunedin to just a few artists! Up till 1850, there’s only a …

    Read more
    1 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    Deans Bush–Pūtaringamotu and the Mystery of the Missing Tree Ferns

    by Mike Pole September 22, 2024
    by Mike Pole September 22, 2024

    Tree ferns are indicators of a consistently pretty wet climate. In New Zealand-Aotearoa, if you look closely (and not too closely if …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    The Immolation of Waimate Bush, Canterbury, New Zealand

    by Mike Pole July 24, 2024
    by Mike Pole July 24, 2024

    In the court case following the 1878 fire that virtually annihilated Waimate Bush, a witness described the wind conditions as “a hurricane” …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    The Lost Taieri/Taiari Bush, near Dunedin, New Zealand

    by Mike Pole June 6, 2024
    by Mike Pole June 6, 2024

    Leads to New Zealand’s  ‘lost forests’ turn up in all sorts of places. I was in the Dunedin Public Library when I …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    Moa ate kōwhai

    by Mike Pole January 29, 2024
    by Mike Pole January 29, 2024

    A little over 700 years ago, humans finally discovered the last habitable place on Earth, Aotearoa-New Zealand (Wilmshurst et al., 2011; Mulrooney …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
  • Biogeography & Vegetation

    Flax/Harakeke – New Zealand’s Resource Curse

    by Mike Pole November 10, 2023
    by Mike Pole November 10, 2023

    The Musket Wars? Shortly after Europeans began operating in Aotearoa-New Zealand (c. 1807-1837), a series of conflicts among the indigenous Maori dramatically …

    Read more
    0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
Newer Posts
Older Posts
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Youtube
  • Bloglovin

@2021 - All Right Reserved. Designed and Developed by PenciDesign


Back To Top
MikePole
  • Home
  • About me
  • Contact me
  • Categories
    • Curio Bay – New Zealand’s Jurassic Fossil Forest
    • New Zealand Geology
    • Supernatural
  • Places
    • Australia
    • Armenia
    • Bosnia
    • Brazil
    • Canary Island
    • China
    • Indonesia
    • Turkey
    • Estonia
    • France
    • Georgia
    • Germany
    • Lebanon
    • Mexico
    • Mongolia
    • Kazakhstan
    • Russia
    • Uganda
    • New Zealand
    • India
    • South Africa