#even though i don't think theres as much overlap with flora and fauna there

[cosmicyeen]

I'll also submit the Köppen climate map to the table:

It's a bit hard to tell apart the shades of green, but the humid subtropical (Cfa) classification lines up very well!

there's so many plants and bugs in my area that are both invasive and from east asia. Chinese privet, kudzu, japanese stiltgrass, japanese beetles, korean perilla/beefsteak plant, joro spiders (which might actually help control brown marmorated stinkbugs, also from east asia!) nonnative wisteria, nonnative bamboo, autumn olive, mimosia tree, and likely more I'm forgetting.

there's also an asian persimmon and an american persimmon!

I also really like the two places on earth that giant salamanders live, if you can guess where

Cryptobranchus alleganiensis, Andrias davidianus, and Andrias japonicus in that order, all members of the same family. Range maps from their respective wikipedias. All the giant salamanders on earth live in east asia or the eastern US!

I don't mean it in a creepy way I promise, but I feel a kinship with China, Japan and Korea i wish more people from my region shared, because...we have sister ecosystems!

It's actually amazing, there are so many plant genera that are not closely related to anything else and just have a couple living species: One (or two) from mid latitude Southeast Asia, and one from the Southeastern USA.

For example, the two living lotus species (sacred lotus and American lotus), the two living tulip tree/ Liriodendron species, the Chinese and American sweetgums (Liquidambar spp.) the Chinese and American trumpet vines (Campsis spp.) the Chinese, Japanese and American wisteria (Wisteria spp), the Chinese, Taiwan and American sassafras (Sassafras spp.) I KNOW i'm forgetting many of them because there are so many. Twins!!!!

And there's so many iconic plant groups shared in common between East Asia and SE USA. Like dogwoods, magnolias, rhododendrons, we even have our own bamboo!!!

I think a lot of how strangely familiar each ecosystem would feel to someone visiting from the other one.

And I bet there's a lot of ecological knowledge and insights we could share with each other...

Sister ecosystems...