Difference between boreal and taiga?

Question

What's the difference between boreal and taiga?

If there is no difference between the boreal and taiga biomes, why is there a distinction between the two on this map? http://www.canadainfolink.ca/hsi_26706.gif

Thanks.

Answer 1

one big difference is that boreal areas usually have softwood forests and taiga areas are barren except for a few shrubs.

from warmest to coldest it is:

1: tropical

2:temperate

3:boreal

4: taiga

5: polar

boreal and taiga can be used to describe different geographical aspects of an area most commonly temperature wise or to distingguish between physiographic regions

Answer 2

"  In Canada, boreal forest is the term used to refer to the southern part of this biome, while "taiga" is used to describe the more barren northern areas of the Arctic tree line."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiga

The above quote was taken from wikipedia which is not the best site to use as a resource.

All the other sites say that the two terms are the same.

"Known in Russia as the taiga, the boreal forest constitutes one of the largest biome in the world, covering some 12 million square kilometres."

http://www.borealforest.org/index.php?ca...

"The taiga is also known as the boreal forest. "

http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org/taiga.ht...

"Taiga: The Canadian Boreal Forest"

http://raysweb.net/specialplaces/boreal-...

"The taiga or boreal forest exists as a nearly continuous belt of..."

http://www.runet.edu/~swoodwar/CLASSES/G...

"Boreal forests, or taiga, represent the largest terrestial biome."

http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/exhibits/bi...

"The Taiga - or Boreal Forest - is a belt "

http://www.taigarescue.org/index.php?vie...

I took a good look at that site you posted. I appears to have been developed by a teacher for his/her students and other teachers. Being a personal site it too may not be 100% accurate as it is a general site with a variety of subjects and not a specialty site. Personally, I would go with sites that specialize in the areas of biomes and/or sites that have been developed by higher level institutions such as:

http://www.borealforest.org

http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/

http://www.taigarescue.org

http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/

Nasa has a site discussing biomes.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Laborat...

On their site is a link to another biomes' site that I have already mentioned agreeing that taiga and boreal are the same.

http://www.runet.edu/~swoodwar/CLASSES/G...