What is the Amazon Rainforest?
The Amazon Rainforest is located in South America and covers 2.1 million square miles. This rainforest stretches into nine countries which include Brail, Columbia, Peru, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana. It also accounts for more than half of the remaining rainforest in the world and is home to more than 10% of the worlds known species. The Amazon Rainforest is important due to the fact it contributes to decreasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which combats climate change. It also produces 20% of the worlds oxygen, and of the plants that are known to have anti-cancer properties, 70% are found in the Amazon Rainforest. Lot's of prescription drugs that save millions of lives have ingredients that are from the Amazon rainforest. Food is also produced naturally in the Amazon Rainforest with nearly 3,000 different fruits coming from it.
Horned Screamer
The horned screamer is a massive 84–95 cm long, 3.5 kg bird, with a small chicken-like bill. The upper parts, head and breast are black, with white speckles on the crown, throat and wing coverts. There is a long spiny structure projecting forward from the crown. This bird can be found in Columbia, Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Suriname, French Guiana, and Guyana.
Wolf Spider
Wolf spiders can be 10 mm to 35 mm in body size. They have eight eyes arranged in three rows. The bottom row has four small eyes, the middle row has two very large eyes, and the top row has two medium-sized eyes. The also have the third best eyesight of any species. The wolf spider is so common that it is found in all countries of the Amazon, and even in ones not in the Amazon.
Ocelot
The ocelot ranges from 68 to 100 centimeters and typically weighs 8 to 18 kilograms. The coat pattern of ocelots can vary, being anything from cream to reddish-brown in color, or sometimes grayish, and marked with black rosettes. The Ocelot is located in every country in the Amazon rainforest and even some out of it like Mexico and the United States.
Orchid
Orchids are the largest family of plants in the entire world. There are 25,000 to 30,000 different species of orchid, of which at least 10,000 can be found in the tropics. While some orchids may only be the size of a nickel when in bloom, others may weigh up to one ton with petals as long as 30 inches, and sprays of small flowers 12 - 14 feet long. The majority of neotropical orchid species can be found in southern Central America, northwest South America, and countries that lie along the Andes Mountains.
Brazil Nut Tree
The Brazil nut tree can get as large as 160 feet tall. It's fruit can be as heavy as five pounds and is generally ripe in January or February. The interior of this fruit contains 10 to 21 nuts, and just in one year a tree can produce 250 pounds of nuts. The nuts are also used as a protein-rich food source, and their extracted oils are a popular ingredient in many natural beauty products. The Brazil nut tree is predominantly found in the Amazon rainforest of Brazil, although it can also be spotted in Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru.
Rubber Tree
In the wild, the rubber tree will grow to heights of 100 to 130 feet, and can live up to 100 years. Its most famous feature is the milky white sap, known as latex, which flows freely from the tree when a sliver of bark is removed. The latex sap from the rubber tree is still used in the modern processing of rubber and is often a substantial source of income for indigenous populations. The rubber tree can be found in the countries of Brazil, Venezuela, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.
Rehabilitating Lands
Farms can lose productivity in the production of fruits or vegetables. Most farmers just clear off more land to make up for that, though there is a push to just rehabilitate land instead. This rehabilitation would include planting better crops that is more adaptable to the suited area of the farm. It could also mean that certain plants should be planted to prevent erosion, or fertilizer should be incorporated into the dirt. By rehabilitating farm land it prevents the need to create more.
Expansion of Protection Areas
Protected areas like national parks are being expanded due to the loss of the Amazon Rainforest. One way the expansion is taking place is the encouragement of locals around and in the rainforest. By helping them improve living conditions and passing laws it has allowed expansion to happen. Though overall conservation largely rests in the hands of the locals. By winning them over to support conservation it not only helps them, but the rest of the world in the process.
Law Enforcement
Brazil has a environmental protection agency called the IBAMA. Though this agency is very underfunded by the Brazilian government. In 2003 alone the entire budget for the IBAMA was $9.5 million. This sound like a lot until reality is faced. The Amazon rainforest is huge, and just the part of it in Brazil takes many people and supplies to manage. Brazil is also the 5th largest country in the world making it even harder for the IBAMA to police the Amazon Rainforest.
