John & Susy Pint

Photos by John Pint Mexico has five big ecosystems and they just happen to converge inside what I call the “ Magic Circle ”  around Guadalajara, an area that many people refer to as Western Mexico. I live in a mile-high oak and pine forest just outside Guadalajara, which puts me in the Temperate Forest Ecosystem. The many foreigners living around Lake Chapala reside in the Arid and Semi-arid Scrubland Ecosystem with flora, fauna, and weather conditions quite different from mine. Communities located northeast of Guadalajara reside in the Grasslands, consisting of mostly flat prairie land while people located along the Pacific Coast are in two other very different, Tropical Ecosystems. This means the inhabitants of Guadalajara can reach any one of Mexico’s ecosystems after only a few hours of driving. It also means that people interested in moving to Western Mexico can literally pick the climate of their choice to live in. Here I will focus on just one of these ecosystems: the Temper...