rainforest

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A Blue Macaw A blue Macaw flying along the clay cliffs.

THE AMAZON RAINFORESTJanuary 2012

More than 1500 bird species live in the Amazon rainforest. Most of the birds there are colorful and very exotic. People claim the birds have beautiful colors to compliment their vibrant surroundings. Many birds do not live in the forest year round but are just passing through, migrating from the South as well as the North. The species that receives the most notice when migrating is the Macaws, which gather by the hundreds, or even the thousands to eat minerals on the clay cliffs to even out their fruity diet. Macaws usually only gather in groups of ten to thirty, the sight of

so many Macaws together, so much color, movement, and sound is a magical experience people find hard to put into words. One species of exotic bird in the Amazon is the Spix’s macaw, which is very endangered and on its way to extinction. The Spix is the rarest bird in the world, and lives only in the rainforests. The Spix had come to symbolize the region and the people of the area where the last Spix in the wild was found. All the different species of beautiful birds in the Amazon should be protected so they will not meet the same fate as the Spix. ~Claire Schmit

The Amazing Birds of the Amazon

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,There is a rapture on the lonely shore,There is society, where none intrudes,By the deep sea, and music in its roar:I love not man the less, but Nature more.~George Gordon, Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

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Beautiful and ExoticFlowers in the

rainforest do not need much sunlight to grow, as the understory of the forest is very shady and moist. Most flowers need a lot of water to thrive, which they receive in the rainforest. The bright colors of the flowers are used to attract birds to pollinate and disperse seeds, as well as add some color to the surrounding decor of greens and browns. One of the most delicate flowers in the rainforest is the Passion Flower. The passion is a vine flower and receives its name from its looks instead of its powers of passion. The yellow and red parts of the beautiful flower resemble the crown of thorns worn by Jesus in the Passion accounts in the Bible. Another beautiful flower in the rainforest is the heliconia

wagerianna also known as lobster-claws. The flower is in a variety of colors, the most regular color pattern is bright red covering most of the bracts, with pale green along the top and yellow along the bottom. The wagerianna is related to the banana, like some of the other flowers in the heliconia family. The flower may resemble lobster claws, but that strangeness only adds to the exotic look of the wagerianna. There are as many as 1500 species of flowers in one four-square mile of rainforest, so these flowers are only a sample of all the amazing and tropical flowers found in the rainforest.

~Claire Schmit

WEATHER

The rain forest as a whole, needs a lot of water to support plant and animal life and growth.  The rain forest its has 3 cm of rain per day, there is always one part of the rain forest that is raining.  For a whole year the rain forest gets about 200cm of rain. In this lush world of the forest, has rain fall every day  of its life. ~Theresa Narog

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Geography

The rainforest has the second

largest river in the world, this

river is called the Amazon. The

total area of the Amazon

Rainforest is 8,511,965 sqkm.

The rainforest takes up about a

quarter of the country all by

itself. ~Theresa Narog

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DangersThere are many

dangers that exist in the rain forest. Some of the plants and animals that live in the rain forest sometimes can kill the human being. In order to live in such an breathtaking place, you will need to be able to survive out in the wild. Even the bugs can cause problems to humans and animals that live in the rain forest. Some people may describe the rain forest to

be a beautiful kill zone. You should never enter the rain forest with out another person with you so if you do get hurt the other person can get help. One of the most popular cause of death in the rain forest is the crocodile. The crocodile is just one of the known dangers of the rain forest but the really the threat is the unknown dangers. Make sure you are will propared before entering the rain forest.

~Theresa Narog

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What Makes Up a RainforestThe rainforest has

many layers of trees. The top layer is the few trees that grow taller than the canopy, called the emergent layer because the tall trees emerge from the forest roof to take the full extremes of the weather. These emergent trees are spread far from each other, and can reach heights of up to 200 feet above the forest floor with trucks up to 16 feet around. Most emergent trees are broad-leaved, hardwood evergreens. The trees that make up the canopy, sometimes called the roof of the forest, usually have the most animals living in the trees because the food is so abundant. Vines and lianas (which are woody vines) also hang out in the canopy. These vines can be as long as

3,000 feet or longer. A plant in the forest that is sometimes thought to be a tree is bamboo, which is a grass, and is edible.

Fruits in the rainforest are not always edible. Some can even be deadly. But the fruits that are edible are usually sweet and addicting. The Pokenoboy and Hog Plum are favorites of the Mayans. The Pokenoboy is a sweet fruit and easily retrieved and very addicting, while the Hog Plum is a sour plant that can be eaten cooked or raw, and can be found everywhere.

~Claire Schmit

The Layers of the Rainforest

Some things can only be grown in the rainforest that we have a taste for like: papaya, passion fruit, okra, macadamia nuts, and guava. Many pharmaceuticals are derived from tropical plants found in the rainforest, like red dye, treatments for asthma, sedatives, and heart disease treatment. Of course there is always the woods, teak, rosewood, sandalwood, and

mahogany wanted for their exotic quality. Many plants are wanted for houseplants as well like the fiddle-leaf fig, and zebra plant to name only a few. Fibers, oils, gums and resins also come out of rainforests to make furniture, rope, fabric, perfumes, beverages, shampoos, flavorings, chewing gum, fuel, paints, and rubber.

~Claire Schmit

Resources

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The People of the Forest

Often we get caught up in all the vegetation of the rainforest that we forget its actually some people’s home. There are about 50,000,000 tribal people that are living in the rainforests.

The Pygmies are very social, having multiple dances and gatherings to keep in touch with each other. The Pygmies are hunters and gatherers, which is how the get their main source of food, fruit and meat.

The Huli hunt and gather also, but they also grow crops, their main source of food is yams and manioc. The Huli are very tall and for special occasions they wear crown out

of feathers and red, yellow, or black face-paint.

The Yanomami were first contacted in 1950, and since then their tribe has been greatly effected by diseases brought by people wanting to vacation at the Yanomami viliage. The tribe’s main food source is plantain, which is a type of banana. Now, as compared to then, there are significantly less indigenous tribes still around today. Many have been completely wiped out by diseases brought by Europeans that the tribes have no immunity to. ~Claire Schmit

THREE TRIBES

The Yanomami Tribe

The Huli Tribe

The Pygmie TribeDuring

the Eocene era is the time when the rain forest was formed. The Amazon rain forest most likely was nearly 55

million years ago. When the humans came to live in the rain forest they effected the rain forest in a dramatic way. ~Theresa

Narog

History