Free Rainforests Essay Sample

The Amazon Rain forest is found in the Amazon Basin of South America. It crisscrosses through several South American countries including Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela among others. It is the largest rain forest in the world and harbors most of the vegetation and animal species that are common in rain forests. These forests can be classified broadly into either tropical or temperate forests but there is little distinction between them. The temperate forests are found in regions closer to the coasts while tropical forests are found in regions within or close to the equator.
These biomes have a wet and warm climate and are locate along the equatorial region approximately 120 to the North and South of the equator. It is characterized by high temperatures and high amounts of rainfall throughout the year. This could be well between 2000 millimeters to 10000 millimeters of rain annually. The temperatures range between 200C to 250C implying that these regions are free of frost at any time of the year. They are said to be among the place3s in the world where rainfall is most abundant.
Soils of tropical rainforests have been for very many years under forest cover. As such deep tropical soils have been over the year formed from the rock underlying beneath. Tropical soils go some meters deep but the top soil is regularly washed away leading to the leaching of vital nutrients. This explains why as opposed t o many people’s perceptions, tropical rainforests such as the soils of the Amazon are nutrient poor and the only the vegetation that survives is lush, composed of plants which have the ability to store nutrients. The subsoil is more fertile than the top soil as it is composed of decomposed vegetation and animals.
Over a third of world’s animals live in the Amazon rainforest .The sheer ecological balance of both flora and fauna in the Amazon support a wide range of animals. The forest is home to many animals such as the jaguar, anaconda, capybara (world’s largest rodent), orangutan and Toco Toucan among others. The Amazon is able to support life of a wide range of animals due to easy access to water, abundant food and limited competition for resources such as space. Compared to other biomes around the globe, the Amazon carries many species with unique characteristics. The world’s largest snake is found in the Amazon. The anaconda belongs to the python family but due to the environmental influence on evolution and subsequently genes, the anaconda grew bigger than its sister did species.
The vegetation in these areas is evergreen due to the abundant. This vegetation has a unique capability of storing nutrients within their tissues. They tend to form canopies which are colossal in size and have varying in heights. Due to this, there is little presence of vegetation on the forests floors as there is little amount of sunlight to support such vegetation. On the forest floor, there are few shrubs. These canopies tend to form four levels of vegetation classified on the basis of the canopy heights. In essence therefore, these forests are characterized tall growing plants with large and wide growing leaves and little vegetation composed of shrubs on the underground.
Rain forests vegetation is characterized by four different types of vegetation. These include the tropical vegetation such as Heliconia, lianas, saprophytes, bromeliad and strangler fig, native plants such as orchids, Bengal bamboo, bougainvilleas and figs, aqua plants such as the water fern, water lettuce water hyacinth and water lilies and epiphytes plants such as ferns, orchids and air plants. Due to the varying requirements for each type of plant type, the Amazon rain forest is able to adequately sustain all these types of vegetation. Some plants grow directly from the soil while others grow on other plants for instance the air plants. Other plants like the fern are able to thrive well under the canopies. The tall growing plants can grow to between 65 feet and 150 feet above ground level and they include trees such as vines and orchids.