FAO Forestry country profiles - natural woody vegetation

Broadleaved

Cloud Forest

This forest occurs at the highest elevations on Savai´i and ´Upolu. These habitats are typified by constant cloud cover, dripping wet conditions, and a clothing of epiphytes on tree trunks and branches. On Savai´i, a medium-statured cloud forest occurs above 1 200 m elevation on the volcanically young and permeable substrate of Mount Silisili, unlike the gnarled, low forests seen on more poorly drained substrates (e.g. Ta´u in American Samoa). The Savai´i forest is dominated by a 15 to 20 m high canopy of Dysoxylum huntii, Omalanthus acuminatus, Reynoldsia pleiosperma and Weinmannia samoense. Other common trees include Coprosma savaiiense, Psychotria xanthochlora, Spiraeanthemum samoense and Streblus anthropophagorum.