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Himalaya
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The Himalaya Hotspot is home to the world’s highest mountains, including Mt. Everest. The mountains rise abruptly, resulting in a diversity of ecosystems that range from alluvial grasslands and subtropical broadleaf forests to alpine meadows above the tree line. Vascular plants have even been recorded at more than 6,000 meters. The hotspot is home to important populations of numerous large birds and mammals, including vultures, tigers, elephants, rhinos and wild water buffalo.
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| Hotspot Original Extent (km 2) |
741,706 |
| Hotspot Vegetation Remaining (km 2) |
185,427 |
| Endemic Plant Species |
3,160 |
| Endemic Threatened Birds |
8 |
| Endemic Threatened Mammals |
4 |
| Endemic Threatened Amphibians |
4 |
| Extinct Species† |
0 |
| Human Population Density (people/km 2) |
123 |
| Area Protected (km 2) |
112,578 |
| Area Protected (km 2) in Categories I-IV* |
77,739 | †Recorded extinctions since 1500. *Categories I-IV afford higher levels of protection.
overview
Stretching in an arc over 3,000 kilometers of northern Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan and the northwestern and northeastern states of India, the Himalaya hotspot includes all of the world’s mountain peaks higher than 8,000 meters. This includes the world’s highest mountain, Sagarmatha (Mt. Everest) as well as several of the world’s deepest river gorges.
This immense mountain range, which covers nearly 750,000 km², has been divided into two regions: the Eastern Himalaya, which covers parts of Nepal, Bhutan, the northeast Indian states of West Bengal, Sikkim, Assam, and Arunachal Pradesh, southeast Tibet (China), and northern Myanmar; and the Western Himalaya, covering the Kumaon-Garhwal, northwest Kashmir, and northern Pakistan. While these divisions are largely artificial, the deep defile carved by the antecedent Kali Gandaki River between the Annapurna and Dhaulagiri mountains has been an effective dispersal barrier to many species.
The abrupt rise of the Himalayan Mountains from less than 500 meters to more than 8,000 meters results in a diversity of ecosystems that range, in only a couple of hundred kilometers, from alluvial grasslands (among the tallest in the world) and subtropical broadleaf forests along the foothills to temperate broadleaf forests in the mid hills, mixed conifer and conifer forests in the higher hills, and alpine meadows above the treeline.
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The black-necked crane (
Grus nigricollis, VU) is the only alpine crane in the world. Its breeding range is mostly confined to China’s Qinghai-Tibetan plateau.
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