Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Satellites in September recorded 32,017 hotspots in the world's largest rainforest, a 61% rise from the same month in 2019. [140] In addition, October saw a huge surge in the number of hotspots in the forest (more than 17,000 fires are burning in the Amazon's rainforest) – with more than double the amount detected in the same month last year.
Such activity is generally illegal within these nations, but enforcement of environmental protection can be lax. The increased rates of fire counts in 2019 led to international concern about the fate of the Amazon rainforest, which is the world's largest terrestrial carbon dioxide sink and plays a significant role in mitigating global warming.
In part, this is due to the rarity of fire. Unlike drier forests, which burn periodically, temperate rain forests are naturally subject to only small-scale disturbances, such as blow-downs and avalanches. This rain forest spans a wide range of latitude - from about 40 degrees north to about 60 degrees north. The differences in climate from ...
Amazon River rain forest in Peru. Tropical rainforests are hot and wet. Mean monthly temperatures exceed 18 °C (64 °F) during all months of the year. [4] Average annual rainfall is no less than 1,680 mm (66 in) and can exceed 10 m (390 in) although it typically lies between 1,750 mm (69 in) and 3,000 mm (120 in). [5]
Fire has played a major role in shaping the world's vegetation. The biological process of photosynthesis began to concentrate the atmospheric oxygen needed for combustion during the Devonian approximately 350 million years ago. Then, approximately 125 million years ago, fire began to influence the habitat of land plants.
The 2020 Brazil rainforest wildfires were a series of forest fires that were affecting Brazil, with 44,013 outbreaks of fires registered between January and August in the Amazonas and Pantanal. [ 2 ] [ 3 ] Within the Amazon, 6,315 outbreaks of fire were detected in the same period. [ 4 ]
Tropical rainforests have been called the "jewels of the Earth" and the "world's largest pharmacy", because over one quarter of natural medicines have been discovered there. [2] Rainforests as well as endemic rainforest species are rapidly disappearing due to deforestation, the resulting habitat loss and pollution of the atmosphere. [3]
At around 1200 square kilometres the Wet Tropics Rainforest is a part of Australia's largest contiguous area of rainforest. Contains 30% of frog , marsupial and reptile species in Australia, and 65% of Australia's bat and butterfly species. 20% of bird species in the country can be found in this area including the threatened cassowary .