Abstract
Tropical evergreen rain forest forms the natural vegetation of the mountains of Sri Lanka. Lower montane rain forest covers the slopes between 900 and 1,500 m asl. The 1,500-m line is a sharp boundary between lower and upper montane rain forest, as it is the lower limit of a frequent and dense cloud cover. The highest peak, Pidurutalagala (2,524 m), is still below timberline. As conifers and Fagaceae are lacking, their ecological role is taken over by other plant families. Besides Lauraceae and Myrtaceae, Clusiaceae and Symplocaceae have an exceptionally high frequency. Strobilanthes species (Acanthaceae) play a special role in the ecology of these forests, as their cycles of flowering, fruiting, and dieback dominate life on the forest floor.
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Werner, W.L. (1995). Biogeography and Ecology of the Upper Montane Rain Forest of Sri Lanka (Ceylon). In: Hamilton, L.S., Juvik, J.O., Scatena, F.N. (eds) Tropical Montane Cloud Forests. Ecological Studies, vol 110. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2500-3_25
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2500-3_25
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