Category Science

Inside a rainforest

 

 

 

The heat and heavy rain in a rainforest are perfect for living things. Trees grow tall and flowers blossom. The lush rainforest provides food and shelter for the millions of creatures that it is home to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rainforests recycle their own water

Every day, the sun heats the rainforest, causing water from trees and plants to evaporate (turn into its gas form – water vapour). As the water vapour rises, it cools and condenses back into liquid water and forms rain clouds. When it rains, the plants soak up rain and the water cycle begins again.

 

 

 

 

 

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What are rainforests?

 

 

Rainforests are dense, warm, wet forests, with huge trees. They are very special places. Over half the known animals and plants in the world live in rainforests, and new ones are being discovered all the time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a tropical rainforest. It rains here almost every day.

More than two metres of rain falls in a tropical rainforest every year. It is a hot, wet and steamy place with little variation in weather and no seasons. As a result, the trees and plants stay green and keep growing all year round.

 

 

 

 

 

The white areas were once rainforests.

An area of rainforest the size of a football pitch is destroyed every second! They are cut down for their wood, or to make way for farms, mines or roads. These unique and important environments – which affect the world’s weather and provide us with medicine, food and oxygen – could be lost forever.

The green areas on this map show where tropical rainforests grow today.

Most of the world’s rainforests are tropical. They grow in ‘the tropics’, a hot area just north and south of the equator. The equator is the imaginary line we draw around the middle of the earth. Some rainforests grow further north and south of the equator where it is cooler. These are temperate rainforests.

 

Flesh – eating plants

 

 

 

 

Some plants trap insects and suck the goodness out of their bodies. Insects go to sundews or flytraps to look for food. When they do, they may be held by sticky hairs or trapped by strong leaves that snap shut like jaws!

 

 

 

 

 

This plant feeds on tasty insects.

This plant catches insects on its sticky leaves. Other plants catch insects by looking and smelling good. Pitcher plants do this. The insect goes to the pitcher plant to feed on the nectar. Once inside the plant’s hollow leaf, it cannot climb out because the walls are slippery. It dies in the liquid at the bottom, dissolves and becomes plant food.

 

 

Insects stick to the hairs on sundew plants.

This sundew plant oozes sticky juice onto the insect. The insect isn’t strong enough to escape. Its body turns to liquid and the plant absorbs the insect through its leaves!

 

 

 

 

 

This Venus flytrap has a fly in its jaws.

This fly has been tricked into stepping onto the leaf of a Venus flytrap while it was searching for nectar. The leafy jaws snap shut when anything touches the hairs. The Venus flytrap kills its victims using a liquid that turns the fly’s body into juice. It can take the flytrap two weeks to digest one fly.

 

Plants as food

 

People and animals need plants for food. We can eat all the different parts of plants. We can eat the stem and leaves of some plants, but sometimes we eat the roots, the fruits or the seeds.

 

 

 

 

We eat some flowers but not others.

Did you know that broccoli and cauliflowers are edible flowers? Capers are edible flower buds. Other flowers are not at all good to eat. It is dangerous to eat some flowers. Eating this iris would make you ill.

 

 

 

 

Farmers sow seeds. The seeds grow into plants for us to eat.

Farmers water their crops if there is too little rain. They harvest the crops when they are ready. If there is too much rain or wind, or it is too hot or too cold, the crops may be ruined.

 

 

 

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Seeds life Cycle

When a seed bursts into life and a new plant begins to grow, it is part of a greater life cycle. The new plant grows and makes new seeds which may grow into new plants. Dead plants also give life to other plants and animals.

 

 

 

Pine cones contain lots of seeds. They contain the information they need to make a new plant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

If the seed lands on soil and has water and light, it may germinate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With enough light and water, the tiny plant continues to grow.

 

 

 

 

 

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When seeds begin to grow

 

 

 

 

A seed needs water and warmth so it can start to grow into a seedling. Then it needs sunlight, soil and more water so it can grow into a full size plant. If it has too much water it will rot. If it has too little water it will dry out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a bean seed. It grows a root and a shoot.

A seed can look dead, but it is often just dormant. Some seeds can lie dormant for hundreds of years. The time when a seed begins to grow is called germination. The root grows first and then the shoot appears.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beans can grow in a jar.

Soak some beans in water overnight. The next day, place the bean seeds between blotting paper and the side of a glass jar. Pour in a few centimeters of water. Put the jar on a warm, sunny window-sill. Add a little water each day. Your bean will grow a root and a shoot. When it grows too big for the jar, plant it in soil. If it has flowers and they are fertilized it will make new bean seeds.