he Australian tropical rain forests contain over 2500 species of higher plants, representing more than 10% of the Australian flora. These rain forests stretch from the lowland and montane tropical rain forests of north east Queensland through to the drier and monsoonal rain forests of the Northern Territory and the Kimberley district of Western Australia. 

The rain forests of the Wet Tropics area of north east Queensland are the most species rich, with over 2100 species. There is a decrease in species richness along the rainfall (strictly seasonality of rainfall) gradient to the monsoonal rain forests of Western Australia, where there are approximately 450 species.
 

"Australian Tropical Rain Forest Trees and Shrubs" is a Windows based key, covering the approximately 1750 taxa of rain forest trees and shrubs, from all Australian tropical rain forests.

The rain forest key is a multiple-entry identification system, where the user decideswhich characters to choose based on the specimen in hand. This is a simpler identification process than with conventional botanical keys where the user has to work through a series of questions, in which the features to be used in the identification are pre-determined.