The montane forests (altitude > 600 m) at the semi-arid of Northeastern Brazil are surrounded by non forest thorn deciduous vegetation (caatinga), showings distinct flora and plant physionomy. They occur in upper mountains due to special climatic condition, originated by altitude. As the literature shows that the flora of these forests also varies according to the degree of humidity, a floristic survey was carried out in a humid montane forest located at Parque Ecológico João Vasconcelos-Sobrinho, city of Caruaru, Pernambuco, in order to compare the results with other montane forests in the region. We registered 332 species/subspecies of 85 families. Fabaceae, Asteraceae, Rubiaceae, Solanaceae and Myrtaceae were the richest families. Comparative analysis with other montane forest show that the proportion of tree species decrease and bushes increase as increasing the distance of the Atlantic coast.
Brejo de altitude; floristic survey; habit; humid forest
