The protected areas of Nepal cover mainly forested land and are located at various altitudes in the Terai, in the foothills of the Himalayas and in the mountains, thus encompassing a multitude of landscapes and preserving a vast biodiversity in the Palearctic and Indomalayan realms.
Nepal covers 147,181 km2 (56,827 sq mi) in the central part of the Himalayas.
Altitudes range from 67 m (220 ft) in the south-eastern Terai to 8,848 m (29,029 ft) at Mount Everest within a short horizontal span.
This extreme altitudinal gradient has resulted in 11 bio-climatic zones ranging from lower tropical below 500 m (1,600 ft) to nival above 5,000 m (16,000 ft) in the High Himalayas, encompassing nine terrestrial ecoregions with 36 vegetation types.
[7] Two wildlife reserves were declared as national parks in 2017.