Amazon Rainforest series - part 1: an overview and general facts

Hi everyone,

This is our newest eco system mini series. Today, we are talking about the Amazon Rainforest.

There will be no schedule to these posts because we've found we're not very good at keeping to them! However, we will try to post these fairly regularly!

The Amazon is a fascinating ecosystem and one we are very excited to explore further and hopefully share lots of facts and interesting information about this amazing rainforest.

The Amazon covers an area of 7 000 000 km2. 5 500 000 km2 of that is covered in rainforest. The rest is part of the basin. It stretches over 9 countries. The rainforest is named after the river, the Amazon, which flows from southwestern Peru into the Atlantic Ocean on the north-eastern coast of Brazil. 6 840 km long, the Amazon river is the second longest river in the world.

Around 400-500 indigenous tribes live in the forest. 50 of those are believed to have never had contact to the outside world!

Numbers

40 000 plant species …

1 300 bird species …

3 000 fish species …

430 mammals species …

2 500 000 insect species …

… live in the Amazon.

The ecosystem of the Amazon rainforest is complex and incredible. This first post was a small overview. In the next one, we'll explore the ecosystem and the various food chains of the Amazon!

We'll be back soon but in the meantime, keep looking after this beautiful world! :)

Images:

River view: This image, owned by Anna & Michal (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Map: This image, owned by Lou Gold (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rainforest

https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/amazon-rainforest/

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