Flora of Pakistan

Pakistan's native flora reflects its varied climatic zones, which range from arid and semi-arid to temperate and tropical.
For further details of habitats, see Ecoregions of Pakistan, Forestry in Pakistan and Wildlife of Pakistan.

Distribution

Pakistan has conifer forests in most of the northern and north-western highlands. These occur from 1,000 to 4,000 m altitudes. Swat, Upper Dir, Lower Dir, Malakand, Mansehra and Abbottabad districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are the main areas covered with coniferous forests. Pindrow fir and Morinda spruce occupy the highest altitudes, deodar and blue pine, the intermediate heights, and chir pine, occupy the lower areas with meadows of orchids, rose and jasmine scattered in the valleys.

In most of Punjab and Sindh, the Indus plains have many fluvial landforms that support various natural biomes including tropical and subtropical dry and moist broadleaf forestry as well as tropical and xeric shrublands and kair which provide firewood. The riparian woodlands grow in narrow belts along the banks of River Indus and its tributaries. The main tree species include sheesham and babul, while the dominant shrubs are reed beds and tamarisk bushes. The diverse Margalla hills ecoregion has rain loving plants like bombax ceiba, ficus lacor and butea monosperma. The forests of Bhimber particularly the Deva Vatala National Park has trees like Mango and Neem.

In the south of Sindh are Indus River Delta in west and Great Rann of Kutch in east. The largest saltwater wetland in Pakistan is the Indus River Delta. Unlike many other river deltas, it consists of clay soil and is very swampy. The Great Rann of Kutch below the Thar Desert is not as swampy and exhibits shrubland vegetation of rather dry thorny shrubs as well as marsh grasses of Apluda and Cenchrus. Other saltwater wetlands are located on the coast of Balochistan such as at Sonmiani and Jiwani. These and Indus River Delta support mangrove forestry, mainly of species Avicennia marina.