Excerpt from A Montane Rain-Forest: A Contribution to the Physiological Plant Geography of Jamaica

The vegetation of Jamaica is of particular interest, both by reason of the wealth of the flora of which it is made up and because of the diversity which is given it by the varied geological, topographic, and climatic conditions which exist within the limits of so small an island. Jamaica lies in the center of the Caribbean Sea in 18° N. Latitude, is about 150 miles long, and from 25 to 50 miles wide. Its most salient physical feature is the central mountainous axis, the eastern end of which is lofty and of relatively recent geologic age, while the western two-thirds are lower and older; the recent formations being mostly shales, conglomerates, and tuffs, the older limestone. The mountain ous interior is bordered on the north by a very narrow coastal plain, on the south by a plain which is narrow opposite the loftier mountain mass, but wide in the southwestern parishes of the island. The higher elevations of the eastern end constitute the Blue Mountain Range, which attains to an altitude of feet meters). Not only do the Blue Mountains present conditions of temperature that result in their own vegetation being distinct from that of the lowlands, but they moreover serve as a barrier to the trade winds, and thereby give differences of rainfall and humidity on their north and south sides which are of importance in determining the character of the lowland vegeta tion. The greatest rainfall in the island is registered at high elevations on the northern slopes of the Blue Mountains, while the least occurs at the coast to the south of them. The lower and older portion of the mountainous axis, which reaches its highest points in Mount Diablo, Bull Head, Dolphin Head, and the Santa Cruz Mountains, is much less diversified than the Blue Mountains in both temperature and rainfall conditions, and strikingly dissimilar to any part of them in its vegetation. South of the older mountainous region are broad savannas, with morasses along the larger streams and deserts on certain parts of the coast.

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