Prior to the arrival of the Lucayan people, the northern Bahamas were originally covered in Bahamian dry forests composed primarily of poisonwood (Metopium toxiferum), gumbo-limbo (Bursera simaruba), and Fabaceae, Arecaceae, Eugenia, and Solanum species, with a unique reptile-dominated faunal community: the top herbivore of this habitat was the extinct Albury's tortoise (Chelonoidis alburyorum) and the top predator was the now-extirpated Cuban crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer).

[4] Following the arrival of the Lucayans around 830 CE, large reptiles became extinct or extirpated within 1–2 centuries, and the original hardwood forests were cleared between 875 and 1090 CE by increasing harvesting for firewood and a newly introduced fire regime for the purposes of cassava cultivation, leading to the islands having a more open habitat increasingly dominated by weedy, secondary-successional species such as southern bayberry (Myrica cerifera), West Indian nettle tree (Trema lamarckianum) and Vachellia species.

bahamensis), while pinepink (Bletia purpurea), bushy beard grass (Andropogon glomeratus), southern bracken fern (Pteridium aquilinum), Florida clover ash (Tetrazygia bicolor), Bahamian trumpet tree (Tabebuia bahamensis), West Indian snowberry (Chiococca alba), devil's gut (Cassytha filiformis), poisonwood (Metopium toxiferum), coontie (Zamia integrifolia) and thatch palm (Coccothrinax argentata) grow in the understory.

Kirtland's warblers (Dendroica kirtlandii) migrate every year from jack pine forests in the Lower Peninsula of Michigan to spend the winter in the Bahamian pineyards.

Many of these species are endemic to this habitat and depend on the pines, and are threatened by activities such as deforestation and storm damage that have led to declines in the extent of the forest.