Plants
This type of flower, known for its bright colors, attracts hummingbirds that help it pollinate.
What is the Heliconia?
This slow-moving animal spends most of its life hanging upside down and even grows algae in its fur.
What is the sloth?
This term describes the large-scale cutting down of trees in tropical rainforests.
What is deforestation?
What is the name of the indigenous group that lives in the rainforests of Brazil and Venezuela?
Yanomami
What is one activity humans do that destroys rainforest habitats?
logging / farming mining?
This tree provides latex, which is used to make rubber products.
What is the Rubber Tree?
Known for its loud calls that can travel up to 3 miles, this monkey primarily eats leaves.
What is the Howler Monkey?
One major consequence of deforestation is the release of this greenhouse gas into the atmosphere.
What is carbon dioxide?
Name one basic need the rainforest provides for the Yanomami
medicine / shelter / spiritual meaning
What happens when too many trees are cut down in the rainforest?
Deforestation
Even though tropical rainforests are full of plants, the soil is not very fertile due to a process caused by heavy rain.
What is nutrient leaching?
This colorful parrot helps rainforest plants by spreading seeds after eating fruits.
What is the Scarlet Macaw?
This illegal activity involves capturing and selling rainforest animals or their parts.
What is wildlife trafficking?
How do the Yanomami help the forest grow back after farming?
Moving their farms from place to place?
What activity in the rainforest contributes to the release of large amounts of greenhouse gases, accelerating climate change?
Burning trees for agriculture or palm oil?
These massive aquatic plants found in the Amazon can grow up to 3 meters wide and support small animals.
What is the Goliath Water Lily?
This green snake lives in trees and hunts small animals in the rainforest.
What is the Emerald Tree Boa?
This big cat is poached in Suriname for its body parts, which are sold on the black market.
What is the jaguar?
Why do the Yanomami only take what they need from the forest?
Keep the forest healthy and protect it for future generations?
How has illegal hunting and pollution affected the rainforest?
Harming animals, plants, and the people who live there?
These two main soil types in the tropical rainforest are often red and poor in nutrients due to high levels of iron and aluminum.
What are Oxisols and Ultisols?
These three types of animals or organisms help tropical rainforests by pollinating plants, spreading seeds, or breaking down dead matter.
What are pollinators, seed dispersers, and decomposers?
Besides contributing to climate change, name two other serious effects of deforestation.
What are soil erosion and species extinction?
Explain one way the Yanomami’s spiritual beliefs are connected to the rainforest.
Believe the rainforest is sacred and filled with spirits, which they honor through rituals?
How do Indigenous communities help protect the rainforest?
Traditional knowledge to care for nature and work to keep the rainforest safe?