The Amazon Rainforest of South America

Exploring Nature’s Short Answer Quiz The Amazon Rainforest of South America Range: The Amazon rainforest of South America is the largest rainforest in the world covering almost half the continent. It stretches across Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Guyana, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. Habitat: The Amazon is a wild and busy place with air that clings like a cloud, hot and moist and is thick with the scent of rotting leaves and strong, sweet flowers. Birds screech from overhead. Hidden animals scurry beneath the foliage rustling leaves as they search for food. Insects buzz and hum and ants march in armies. Animals: In the Amazon rainforest of Brazil, a golden lion tamarin scoops out and eats insects and other small animals from the water center of bromeliads. A three-toed sloth slowly munches green leaves, its fur growing a green moss in the wet air. This helps to hide it from hungry meat eaters. Just above the trees a giant harpy eagle soars and looks prey to catch with its sharp claws. The trees are filled with sound and color -- a noisy scarlet macaw, a toucan or a spider monkey. On the forest floor, the agouti feeds on an avocado dropped from above. The leftover seed may take root in the rotting leaves if there is enough light. Nearby a tapir nibbles at leaves, while in the bush a hunting jaguar, one of the biggest predators in the Amazon, sniffs the air for the scent of prey. Any animals caught unaware on the forest floor can become a meal for the hungry cat. A butterfly searches for blossoms and a red-eyed tree frog waits for insects. Hummingbirds hover at giant blossoms to feed on nectar. While they collect, they carry pollen to another blossom, fertilizing the flowers as they go. Wasps, bees and bats also pollinate flowers as they collect nectar and pollen. Ants are everywhere, busily carrying leaves or scraps of food back to their homes. They make a marching line for miles. There are many butterflies in the Amazon, like the brilliant blue morpho glistening in the soft light. Owl butterflies search for ripened fruit while painted ladies, monarchs, and heliconids feed on flower nectar and flash their bright colors through the forest. Plants: Plants, like everything else in the rainforest, grow to giant sizes. The kapok tree can grow 150 feet and has a huge branching trunk at the bottom called a buttress to balance it in the shallow rain forest soil. In these buttresses, animals like boa constrictors find a safe place to hide. The monkey nut tree grows large cannonball fruits. The milk tree, when cut, spills out white drinkable sap. Brazil nut, mahogany, rubber, palm and mimosa trees, as well as giant ferns, fill out the forest. Vines called lianas wrap around the tree trunks, leaving long hanging tails through the forest. Strangler figs take over trees by rooting in their very bark. Bromeliads, maiden- hair ferns, and many colorful orchids root in the crotches of branches where leaves and soil collect. Exploring Nature’s Short Answer Quiz Short Answer Quiz The Amazon Rainforest of South America From your reading, fill in the short answers about the Amazon Rainforest and label the animals (below), then color in the habitat on the map (right).