Help the Rainforests of the World

Via The Pragmatic Progressive Page / Facebook

The tropical rainforests of the world are the Earth's oldest ecosystems and one of the Earth's most precious gifts to us.

How do we define a rainforest? Although rainforests may vary, there are similarities that we can identify:

·         Location: rainforests are found in the tropics,

·         Rainfall: rainforests receive around 80 inches (200 cm) of rain per year,

·         Canopy: rainforests have a canopy, which is the layer of branches and leaves formed by closely spaced rainforest trees. Most of the plants and animals in the rainforest live in the canopy. The canopy may be 100 feet (30 m) above the ground.

·         Biodiversity: rainforests have a high level of biological diversity or“biodiversity”. Biodiversity is the name for all living things—like plants, animals, and fungi—found in an ecosystem. Scientists believe that about half of the plants and animals found on Earth’s land surface live in rainforests.

·         Symbiotic relationships between species: species in the rainforest often work together. In a symbiotic relationship, two different species benefit by helping each other—you can think of it as a partnership. For example, some plants produce small housing structures and sugar for ants. In return the ants protect the plants from other insects that want to feed on the plant’s leaves.

HOW CAN WE SAVE RAINFORESTS?

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Rainforests are disappearing very quickly. The good news is there are a lot of people who want to save rainforests. The bad news is that saving rainforests is not going to be easy. It will take the efforts of many people working together in order to ensure that rainforests and their wildlife will survive for your children to appreciate, enjoy, and benefit from.

Some steps for saving rainforests and, on a broader scale, ecosystems around the world can be abbreviated as TREES:

·         Teach others about the importance of the environment and how they can help save rainforests.

·         Restore damaged ecosystems by planting trees on land where forests have been cut down.

·         Encourage people to live in a way that doesn't hurt the environment

·         Establish parks to protect rainforests and wildlife

·         Support companies that operate in ways that minimize damage to the environment.

Source: Mongabay