Fantasy map DRAFT - need help with vegetation

[Falconius]

If you're aiming for a sort of Mediterranean area, I'd say there shouldn't be any fir/pine/northern vegetation at all. In fact surely there shouldn't really be any forests - I don't know much about the med, but it's always palm trees to me that said, you have a lot of forest on the map - I'd suggest you break up the forest on the southern/eastern continent a bit more, since it is pretty much a solid big forest as it is right now.

The Mediterranean is the same for most countries bordering the sea for the most part except for the northern coast of Africa. Think Italy or maybe California and it gives a pretty good impression of the overall area would be like. There are palm trees, but generally only near the coasts, mostly its deciduous type trees, a lot of flowering or fruit bearing trees, olives etc. There is a rainy season in which everything gets very green and colourful and a dry season where grasses and other lower vegetation turns brown and everything gets covered with dust. During that period plants are dependent on dew to survive. According to Wikipedia southwestern Australia coast is in the same classification.

In the southern US there is desert bordering the Rockies all over the place, including Death Valley. And if I'm not mistaken Salt Lake is also in or around a desert. Regardless I don't think the OP has any desert in his map from what I can tell.

To the OP, it really depends on how inhabited the area is and for how long. Many of the native species take a while to grow and propagate so if logging is occurring at a fast pace it will soon turn sparse indeed. In the second Temple Period (around the time Romans really came to power) there was a major glass industry in Israel and the whole country got very heavily logged, this among other things like war ensuring trees were rather sparse. The state of sparsity lasted pretty much until modern Israel when major replanting projects occurred, and now there are forests all over the place. It should be noted that a lot of these replanted forest are filled with conifers not just broad-leaves, (if I had to guess why is maybe they are hardier or grow faster? I don't know). Also they are in the mountains and hills for the most part since the lowlands are used for farming.

[madbird-valiant]

According to Wikipedia southwestern Australia coast is in the same classification.

Hmm fantasy setting entirely forested by gumtrees and eucalyptus needs to happen.

And the OP mentioned that he was thinking about putting desert near the mountains in the south-west - I was just pointing out that desert on one side of a mountain range and lush forest on the other doesn't 100% gel, in my mind at least.

[Falconius]

I was just pointing out that desert on one side of a mountain range and lush forest on the other doesn't 100% gel, in my mind at least.

Not so much with the lush forest I'd agree with you there. That said one side of a mountain range is generally wetter than the other. And from what I can see on Google Maps one side of the South American continent is very dry and the other very lush divided by the coastal mountains. Also in the mountains dividing India from China it looks like there is a massive precipitation change from jungles to desert. Looking around it actually looks fairly common, more common than I would have expected actually. Hmm...

Gumtrees and Eucalyptus does not sound like the Mediterranean hehe. Australia, why you always got to be so difficult. :p

[madbird-valiant]

And from what I can see on Google Maps one side of the South American continent is very dry and the other very lush divided by the coastal mountains.

To be fair those mountains are massive and half-volcanic, and the lush side is down pretty close to sea level while the other side is thousands of feet up, but I didn't realise that was a trend. Hmmmmm.