forests of the planet

Famous Rainforests

Famous Rainforests

A rainforest, or a wet forest, is a forested biome with high annual rainfall. Tropical rainforests arise in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, but temperate rain forests also exist. In addition to prodigious rainfall, many rainforests are characterized by a high number of resident species and tremendous biodiversity of their flora and fauna.

The Amazon Rainforest is a moist broadleaf forest in the Amazon Basin of South America. It encompasses 7 million km² (1.2 billion acres), with parts located within 9 nations: Brazil (with 60% of the rainforest), Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana. This forest represents over 1/2 of the planet's rainforests. States or departments in 4 nations bear the name Amazonas for the Amazon. Amazonian rainforests comprise the largest and most species rich tract of tropical rainforest that exists.

Deforestation is the conversion of forested areas to non forested areas. More than a fifth of the Amazon Rainforest has been destroyed, and the forest which remains is threatened. In a span of ten years in the nineties, the total area of forest lost in the Amazon rose from 41.5 million hectares to 58.7 million hectares - an area twice the size of Portugal, with most of the lost forest becoming cattle pasture. In 96, the Amazon was reported to have shown a 34% increase in deforestation since 1992.

The Ituri Rainforest is located in the Ituri region of eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Ituri Rainforest is about 63,000 square kilometres in area. Elevation in the Ituri ranges from about 700 m to 1000 m. Average temperature is 31° C (88° F) and the average humidity is about 85% . About one-fifth of the rainforest is made up of the Okapi Wildlife Reserve, a World Heritage Site. It is also the home of the Mbuti pygmies, one of the hunter-gatherer peoples living in equatorial rainforests characterised by their short height.

Daintree Rainforest is a rainforest near Daintree, Queensland, named after Richard Daintree. It is one of the oldest rainforests on the planet and is the home of the Idiot fruit. Part of the forest is protected by the Daintree National Park. The forest is drained by the Daintree River.

The Daintree Rainforest lies on the coast, north of Cairns in tropical far north of Australia. This patch of forest is one of the most diverse and beautiful examples of nature in the world. It is home to the largest range of plants and animals on earth, and all are found within the largest chunk of rainforest in Australia - an area spanning approximately 1200 square kilometres.

The Kilum-Ijim Forest is an area of mountain rainforest in Cameroon's North-West Province. It is found on Mount Oku and the nearby Ijim Ridge in the Cameroon Mountains, with Lake Oku lying in a crater in its center. It is the largest area of Afromontane forest left in West Africa. The area is an important one for biodiversity, including the endemic Bannerman's Turaco and Banded Wattle-eye. The forest is the focus of a successful community conservation project, the Kilum-Ijim Forest Project, which works to protect the forest. The project is a collaboration between the Cameroon Ministry of the Environment and BirdLife International, and focuses on sustainable use of the forests, local management, working to benefit both the biodiversity and local development. The programme works so well that the boundaries of the forest, as mapped by satellite imagery, are expanding, and the success of the idea has led to another sister project in Cameroon, the Bamenda Highlands Forest Project.

Mata Atlântica is the Atlantic Coastal Rain Forest formerly covering wet coastal hills along the Atlantic coast of Brazil, and extending inland as far as Paraguay and the Misiones province of Argentina. Mata Atlantica is a characteristic biome, now designated a World Biosphere Reserve, which contains a large number of highly endangered species including the well known marmosets and golden lion tamarins. It has been extensively cleared since colonial times, mainly for the farming of sugar cane and for urban settlements. The remnant is estimated to be less than 10% of the original and that is often broken into hilltop islands. The Mata Atlantica is unusual in that it extends as a true tropical rainforest to latitudes as high as 24°S. This is because the trade winds produce precipitation throughout the southern winter. In fact, the northern Zona da Mata of northeastern Brazil receives more rainfall between May and August than the southern summer.

Famous artifical forestry

Green Mountain is a common name for "The Peak" on Ascension Island which gained fame for being one of very few large-scale artificial forests.

Many early 19th century accounts, including Charles Darwin's (July 1836), described the volcanic island as barren with few plants, some of them endemic to the island, not to be found anywhere else. A recent census (Ashmole 2000) assesses the island's native vascular plants at 25 to 30 species, about 10 of them endemic to Ascension. This impoverished flora was a consequence of the island being only 1 million years old as well as over 1,000 miles from any major landmass. Then, in 1843, the British plant collector Joseph Dalton Hooker saw the island with Sir James Clark Ross's Antarctica expedition. He assumed a lack of vegetation on the island was caused by some ecological disaster—indeed the last major eruption on Ascension had happened less than 500 years previously— and Hooker started a project to "rebuild" the island with lush plants and animals. He was able to receive much attention worldwide.

Famous European Forestry
The Black Forest (German Schwarzwald) is a wooded mountain range in Baden-Württemberg, south west Germany. It is bordered by the Rhine valley to the west and south. The highest peak is the Feldberg with an elevation of 1,493 meters (4,898 feet). The name Black Forest is from the dark color of the numerous coniferous trees growing in the region. Black Forest ham and the Black Forest gateau originated from the region. Geologically, the Black Forest consists of a cover of sandstone on top of a core of gneiss. During the last ice age, the Würm glaciation, the Black Forest was covered by glaciers; several cirques such as the Mummelsee are remains of this period. The forest consists of pines and firs, some of which are grown in commercial monoculture; the main industry is tourism. Due to logging and land use changes the forest proper is only a fraction of the size it used to be. Moreover, it has suffered serious damage from acid rain. The storm Lothar knocked down trees over hundreds of acres of mountaintops in 1999. This left some of the high peaks and scenic hills bare, with only primary growth shrubs and young fir trees. Rivers in the Black Forest include Danube, Enz, Kinzig, Murg, Neckar, and Rench. The Black Forest is part of the continental divide between the Atlantic Ocean watershed and the Black Sea watershed.

The Teutoburg Forest (German: Teutoburger Wald) is a range of low, forested mountains in the German states of Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia, which was believed to be the environ of a decisive battle in AD 9. The Teutoburger Wald is a northern extension of the central European uplands, extending eastward toward the Weser river, southward from the town of Osnabrück and southeastwards to Paderborn. It is divided by a broad valley, where the city of Bielefeld is located, into the two portions called Northern Teutoburg Forest and Southern Teutoburg Forest.

The highest elevation in the Southern Teutoburg Forest is the Velmerstot (468 m). In the Northern Teutoburg Forest the highest elevation is the Dorenberg (331 m).

The source of the Ems river is located in the southern portion of the Teutoburg Forest.

The Hermannsdenkmal The forest was once believed to be the site of a battle between the Roman Empire and an alliance of Germanic tribes in AD 9. The location of the battle was described by the Roman historian Gaius Cornelius Tacitus as saltus Teutoburgiensis (saltus meaning a forest valley in Latin), and was therefore called the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. However, recent excavations seem to suggest rather firmly that the battle took place further north, at Kalkriese, north of Osnabrück, retroactively turning the now-popular name into a misnomer.

During the 1st century, Arminius (aka Hermann the German), leader of the German forces during the battle, became something of a legend for his crushing victory over the Romans. He was seen as an early protagonist of German resistance to foreign rule and symbol of national unity. A monumental statue of Arminius commemorating the battle, known as the Hermannsdenkmal , was erected on the Grotenburg hill near Detmold, near the site where the most popular theory of the time placed the battle. The monument was inaugurated in 1875 by emperor Wilhelm I. It was only then this region came to be known as the "Teutoburg Forest".

It is also a forest in which the composer Brahms liked to walk.

The Ardennes (pronounced ar-DEN) (Dutch: Ardennen) is a region of extensive forests and rolling hill country, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France (lending its name to the Ardennes département and the Champagne-Ardenne région).
Much of the Ardennes is covered in dense forests, with hills averaging around 350-500 m (1148-1640 ft) in height but rising to over 650 m (2132 ft) in the boggy moors of the Hautes Fagnes (Hohes Venn) region of north-eastern Belgium. The region is typified by steep-sided valleys carved by fast-flowing rivers, the most prominent of which is the Meuse. Its principal cities, Liège and Namur, are both in the Meuse valley. The Ardennes is otherwise relatively sparsely populated.

Famous Asian Forestry

The Himalayan subtropical pine forests are a subtropical coniferous forest ecoregion covering portions of Bhutan, India, Nepal, and Pakistan.

The ecoregion extends across the lower elevations of the great Himalaya range, from Pakistan's Punjab Province in the west through Azad Kashmir, the Indian states of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttaranchal, Nepal, the Indian state of Sikkim, to Bhutan in the east.

The predominant tree in the ecoregion is the drought resistant Chir Pine.

The Zhangjiajie National Forest Park is a unique national forest located in Zhangjiajie City in northern Hunan Province in the People's Republic of China.

In 1988 it was recognized as China's first National Forest Park. In 92, it was officially recognized as a UNESCO World Natural Heritage site. Its unique geographical features make it a popular tourist destination for Chinese citizens and foreigners. Annually the park brings millions of yuan in revenues. Most of that money comes from Korean tourists, and for this reason many of the park workers learn Korean as a second language.

The most notable geographic features of the park are the pillar-like formations that are seen throughout the park. They are the result of many years of erosion. The weather is moist year round, and as a result, the foliage is very dense. Much of the erosion which forms these pillars are the result of expanding ice in the winter and the plants which grow on them. These formations are a hallmark of Chinese landscape, and can be found in many ancient Chinese paintings.

The Shennongjia Forest Zone in eastern Hubei Province shares its border with Chongqing Municipality in the west and Baokang County of Hubei Province in the east. With an area of 3,253 square kilometers , Shennongjia contains four towns, four villages, one national forest park and one national natural reserve area. Because of its marvelous natural scenery, rare foliages, endangered animals and famous legends such as the mysterious "Wild Man" (Chinese Yeti) found in the mountains, the Shennongjia Forest Zone attracted many tourists every year, amongst them researchers and scientists.

Shennongjia was named after a very famous Chinese chief in prehistoric time, Shennong, also known as Yandi. He was believed to be one of the two ancestors of Chinese people (the other was Huangdi ). He invented crockery, discovered herbal medicine by personally tasting herbs and taught his people cultivation. It is said that while Shennong tasted herbs here, he suffered from poisoning more than seventy times. In the end, he managed to discover many useful herbal medicines. To commemorate his work, he became the namesake for Shennongjia.

Shennongding Peak, the highest mountain of Shennongjia, is 3105.4 meters high, above sea level. The lowest point, Shizhu River in south eastern Shennongjia Forest Zone, is only 398 meters high, above sea level. Visitors enjoy witnessing the different beauties of the four seasons at different altitudes. Flowers blossom out at every corner; firs, spruces, dove trees, and many rare trees can be seen everywhere. Virgin forests, clear streams and grand waterfalls in the thousands of canyons beckon visitors to indulge in the wild nature. Peculiar caves also often amaze visitors. There is the Swallow Cave that inhabited thousands of swallows, the Tide Cave that floods three times a day, the Icy Cave that is always icy in summers, the Fish Cave that inhabited lots of fish at times of thunder and much more. Wild animals, some of which are really rare species, are also frequently seen the golden haired monkey, giant salamander, spotted deer and etc.

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