In more inland areas, historic Tlingit hunters may have targeted deer, elk, rabbit, and mountain goats. Plants gathered or harvested include berries, nuts, and wild celery. The term "rainforest" has a wide classification. Typically, rainforests are lush, humid, hot stretches of land covered in tall, broadleaf evergreen trees, usually found around the equator. These areas usually get rain year-round, typically more than 70 inches ( 1,800 millimeters) a year, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica. Various types of forests, such as monsoon forests, mangrove forests and temperate forests, can be considered rainforests. Here's what makes them different: Fact 15:Rainforests are threatened each and every day, especially by practices such as agriculture, ranching, logging and mining.

Most rainforests are structured in four layers: emergent, canopy, understory, and forest floor. Each layer has unique characteristics based on differing levels of water, sunlight, and air circulation. While each layer is distinct, they exist in an interdependent system: processes and species in one layer influence those in another. This type of habitat is very different in comparison to many of the other habitats that you are used to being around. Here you will find 45+ remarkable facts about the tropical rainforest that you may not have known previously. Below are 45+ Facts on Tropical Rainforests In other exciting news, Mongabay was awarded the prestigious 2023 Biophilia Award for Environmental Communication recently. Past winners have included Pulitzer-winning journalist Elizabeth Kolbert and The Guardian. Fact 26:Trees in tropical rainforests are so dense that it takes approximately 10 minutes for the rainfall to reach the ground from the canopy.

Help stabilize the world’s climate: Rainforests help stabilize the world’s climate by absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Scientists have shown that excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from human activities is contributing to climate change. Therefore, living rainforests have an important role in mitigating climate change, but when rainforests are chopped down and burned, the carbon stored in their wood and leaves is released into the atmosphere, contributing to climate change. The new insights could be used by conservationists to focus protected-area design and captive-breeding programs with a view to maximizing genetic diversity. Johnson, H., 2015. Rainforest. [online] National Geographic Society. Available at: < https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/rain-forest/> [Accessed 22 June 2020]. The tropical rainforest biome covers less than 10% of the Earth’s surface but more than half of all terrestrial species live here Rainforest in Tangkoko National Park, North Sulawesi Province, Indonesia in 2017. Photo by Rhett A. Butler

Fact 43:There is a surprising variety of animals. In Central American rainforests, rival strawberry poison dart frogs might wrestle for up to 20 minutes! You can find tropical rainforests in Australia, Central and SouthAmerica, Southeast Asia, Western and Central Africa, Western India and the island of New Guinea. Embed from Getty Images Find out more about forests and climate change here! Send us your favourite facts!Tropical rainforests have long been home to tribal peoples who rely on their surroundings for food, shelter, and medicines. Today very few forest people live in traditional ways; most have been displaced by outside settlers, have been forced to give up their lifestyles by governments, or have chosen to adopt outside customs. Every twenty minutes, an area of rainforest the size of 20 football pitches is cut down. If this rate continues, there will be no rainforests left on earth in 100 years! This is why it is important to do everything we can to preserve them. Every year an area of rainforest the size of New Jersey is cut down and destroyed, mostly the result of human activities. We are cutting down rainforests for many reasons, including:

Rainforests absorb and store carbon dioxide. Because of this, scientists believe that protecting rainforests from deforestation could help to reduce global warming. One example of an animal that lives in the rainforest is the Poison Dart Frog. The name comes from the extremely poisonous venom that people who live in the rainforests actually use on the tips of weapons. Over 350 million tonnes of organic matter is recycled through decomposition within tropical ecosystems each year Read our top 10 facts about the Sun! Embed from Getty Images 5. The rainforest helps with making medicines.Fact 11:70% or more of the plants that are used to treat cancer are found only in the tropical rainforests on the planet. According to research published in the International Journal of Oncology, more than 60% of anticancer drugs originate from natural sources, including rainforest plants. A tree known as the idiot fruit grows in Australia‘s Daintree rainforest. Veiled stinkhorn, fungi found in tropical rainforests smell like rotting food! The droppings of birds in the tropical rainforest grow into new plants. The Chimbu people live in the highland rainforest on the island of New Guinea. The Chimbu practice subsistence agriculture through shifting cultivation. This means they have gardens on arable land that has been cleared of vegetation. A portion of the plot may be left fallow for months or years. The plots are never abandoned and are passed on within the family.

Many houseplants come from rainforest. They thrive in your living room and rainforest due to the low light environment. Fact 17:If the rainforests continue to decline in the way that they have been, then about 5-10 percent of their species will go extinct every ten years. You would be able to find temperate rainforests in places such as New Zealand, Western North America and South-eastern Australia.There are so many different animal species living in the rainforests, that many scientists believe there are many more that haven't even been discovered yet! However, many of these species are on the brink of extinction, and their existence is crucial to maintaining the balance of rainforest ecosystems. Cool Earth. n.d. Why Rainforest? We Depend On It For Everything.. [online] Available at: < https://www.coolearth.org/what-we-do/why-rainforests/> [Accessed 22 June 2020].