Red-shouldered Hawk

Descrizione

This article contains a list of birds found in the Sierra de Manantlán Biosphere Reserve, which straddles the states of Colima and Jalisco in Mexico. The reserve is located in the transition of the Nearctic and Neotropical realms and encompasses parts of the Sierra Madre del Sur, with a wide range of altitudes, climates and soils. The effects of tectonic and volcanic activities and erosion are notable within the reserve. Forest types in the reserve including mesophytic, cloud, and dry deciduous and semi-deciduous tropical forests. Anthropologists know the region as Zona de Occidente, an area notably different to the rest of Mesoamerica. Some ceramic remnants, figurines and graves have been found, but there is little other material evidence. As of 1995 almost 8,000 people lived in the Reserva de la Biosfera Manantlan, engaged mainly in agriculture (corn, beans, tomatoes, sugar cane, watermelon, mangoes), livestock grazing, timber production, and extraction of wood for fuel and mining of coal or minerals. Another 30,000 lived in the surrounding communities and almost 700,000 in the surrounding region of influence. Ecological characteristics The Sierra de Manantlán Biosphere Reserve is located to the extreme north of the Intertropical Convergence Zone. The climate in the region is influenced by various factors in addition to its latitude, such as its proximity to the coast, the effect of its landform – orographic shade – and the breadth of the altitudinal range, which partly goes to explain the high regional biodiversity and the presence of numerous plant formations ranging from tropical forests to those of temperate-cold climates.