LTsER-Montado - Portugal

Cork (Quercus suber) and holm (Quercus ilex L.) oaks were probably the dominant oak species in the Iberian Peninsula south of the Cantabrian/ Pyrenean mountains since the end of the last glaciation. Despite a large range overlap between both species, cork-oak was confined to the mild western regions of the Peninsula (thereby encompassing most of the Portuguese territory), occurring only in small patches along the coast further east, while holm oak was and still is the dominant oak over most of the Centre and East of the Peninsula, subjected to a harsher continental climate. Millennia of land clearing driven by human population growth and need for agricultural land lead to the almost complete elimination of cork oaks from the ...