 Ivy is a relict plant and one of the survivors of the laurel forest (laurisilva) flora in Europe that originally covered much of the Mediterranean Basin when the climate of the region was more humid in the Tertiary era.Laurisilva forests around the Mediterranean disappeared approximately ten thousand years ago at the end of the Pleistocene era, when the climate of the Mediterranean Basin became harsher and drier.Today laurisilva forest persists in some oceanic and island enclaves and Macaronesian islands in the North Atlantic Ocean, where climatic extremes have been moderated.