Neotropical realm

The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms making up Earth's land surface, encompassing the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas along with the whole of South America's temperate zone. It stretches from southern Mexico through Central America and the Caribbean islands to the southern tip of South America, and within the United States it takes in South Florida and coastal central Florida, while in Mexico it covers the Yucatán Peninsula, the southern lowlands, and most coastal areas. Its plant and animal communities differ sharply from those of the neighboring Nearctic realm, a separation that dates to the long geographic isolation of the two continents before the Isthmus of Panama formed two to three million years ago. The realm holds more tropical rainforest than any other biogeographic region, including the Amazon rainforest, and encompasses eleven of Earth's fourteen major biome types, while still supporting an estimated 350 to 400 indigenous languages and dialects across roughly 37 language families in South America alone. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/