Editing Mediterranean Sea (section)

====Shift to a "Mediterranean climate"====
The end of the [[Miocene]] also marked a change in the climate of the Mediterranean basin. Fossil evidence from that period reveals that the larger basin had a humid subtropical climate with rainfall in the summer supporting [[laurel forest]]s. The shift to a "Mediterranean climate" occurred largely within the last three million years (the late [[Pliocene]] epoch) as summer rainfall decreased. The subtropical laurel forests retreated; and even as they persisted on the islands of [[Macaronesia]] off the Atlantic coast of Iberia and North Africa, the present Mediterranean vegetation evolved, dominated by coniferous trees and [[sclerophyllous]] trees and shrubs with small, hard, waxy leaves that prevent moisture loss in the dry summers. Much of these forests and shrublands have been altered beyond recognition by thousands of years of human habitation. There are now very few relatively intact natural areas in what was once a heavily wooded region.