What is a Rainforest?

 Where do you find Rainforests?

 How is a Rainforest Made up?

 Animals of the Rainforest

 Plants of the Rainforest

 People of the rainforest

Destruction of the rainforest

How can you help?

 Amazing Facts

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What is a rainforest?

Rainforests have evolved over millions of years.
They are so amazing and beautiful.

 
These incredible places cover only 6 % of the Earth's surface but yet they contain MORE THAN 1/2 of the world's plant and animal species!

A Rainforest can be described as a tall, dense jungle.  The reason it is called a "rain" forest is because of the high amount of rainfall it gets per year.  The climate of a rain forest is very hot and humid so the animals and plants that exist there must learn to adapt to this climate.
Tropical rainforests are defined primarily by two factors: location (in the tropics) and amount of rainfall they receive. Rainforests receive from 4 to 8 meters of rain a year -- 5 meters of rain falls on the rainforests of Borneo each year, five times as much as on the state of New York. The heavy vegetation blocks the rainfall, and water reaches the forest floor by rolling down branches and trunks or as a fine spray. Another distinctive characteristic is that rainforests have no "seasonality" -- no dry or cold season of slower growth. (Myers, Norman, The Primary Source)
Tropical rainforests are the Earth's oldest living ecosystems. Fossil records show that the forests of Southeast Asia have existed in more or less their present form for 70 to 100 million years. (Myers, Norman, The Primary Source)

Tropical rainforests are the Earth's oldest living ecosystems.

Despite the small land area they cover, rainforests are home to about half of the 5 to 10 million plant and animal species on the globe. Rainforests also support 90,000 of the 250,000 identified plant species. Scientists estimate that there are at least 30,000 as yet undiscovered plants, most of which are rainforest species. (Myers, Norman, The Primary Source)

A typical four square mile patch of rainforest contains as many as 1500 species of flowering plants

Many of the foods we eat today originated in rainforests: avocado, banana, black pepper, Brazilian nuts, cayenne pepper, cassava/manioc, cashews, chocolate/cocoa, cinnamon, cloves, coconut, coffee, cola, corn/maize, eggplant, fig, ginger, guava, herbal tea ingredients (hibiscus flowers, orange flowers and peel, lemon grass), jalapeño, lemon, orange, papaya, paprika, peanut, pineapple, rice, winter squash, sweet pepper, sugar, tomato, turmeric, vanilla, and Mexican yam. The wild strains still in the rainforests of many of these plants provide genetic materials essential to fortify our existing agricultural stock. Many other rainforest plants have great promise to become other staple foods.

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