Natural Vegetation

What is Natural Vegetation?

Natural Vegetation consists of plants which grow naturally and have not been planted by people. Creepers, shrubs, mosses, lichens and cacti are yet other types of plants which grow naturally. However, these plants usually don’t grow all together in the same place. Each type of natural vegetation has its own varieties plants. Differences in the amount of rainfall and temperature are the reason for this.

Plantation owners in Malaysia and shifting cultivators in Brazil cut down the forest someties too.

Tropical Rainforests

The tropical rainforests are both north and south of the Equator and between Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. The high temperature and heavy rainfall throughout the year are the reasons for the trees to grow so tall and close together. Their branches high up and meet to form together a canopy which is the top layer of tropical rainforest. The middle layer of smaller trees and lianas (creepers), such as rattan, fills the spaces between the trees. The lianas wind around the tree trunks and cross from tree to tree as they climb in search of light.

Mahogany, meranti and rosewood are three of thousands of species of plants in this type of forest. There are also bamboos which are one of the fastest growing plants in the world. One type of bamboo can grow 90cm in just a day. There are also plants which live off the trees, growing out of the trunks and branches.

All these plants make dense vegetation. The trees are evergreen, there is no particular season in which the plants shed their leaves. However, leave-fall is not haphazard, different types of species of plants shed their leaves at different times and seasons of the year. As there are a lot of leaves on the branches of the canopy, they prevent the sunlight from coming in and that is the reason it is always shady inside. The absence of sunlight prevents a lot of undergrowth and of plants near the ground. Emergent trees are trees which grow taller than the canopy. Buttress roots support the huge trees.

Spider Omelets

All tropical rainforests of the world, have hundreds of speciese of plants, animals, inscects, including deadly snakes and frogs and giant centipedes. Brazil had over 50, 000 species of plants, the largest number in any other country in the world.

In 2007 scientists exploring the Brazilian rainforest in South America were exicted to find 24 species of animals and insects which were previously unknown. The River Amazon flows through this rainforest and they found 6 new species of fish, also tweleve new speices of dung beetles, a new species of ant and five new species of frogs. Their most amazing discovery was a black frog with a pattern of purple hoops all over it.

The tribes who live in the Amazon forest regard bird-eating spiders as their favourite food. They cook the spiders over a fire and then put them into hot water. This helps them to remove the hairs. Then they cut up the spiders and eat the soft parts. Sometimes they squeeze out the spiders’ eggs onto a leaf and cook them over a fire like a spider omelet.

In 2007, two travelers were lost in the Amazon forest for five weeks without food. They had difficulty speaking and moving after swallowing the spiders’ poisonous venom when eating poorly cooked spiders. When these men where rescued they were covered with bites from tropical fleas and were infested with worms which had burrowed into their flesh.



Cold temperate coniferous forest

This type of forest is only north of the Equator. This forest is called coniferous because they consist of conifer trees such as spruce trees. Some conifer trees form a dark green “carpet” over a large area when the natural environment has been left undisturbed. There are different types of conifer trees such as Fir, Pine, Spruce but there is usually on growing in an area.

The temperatures are below freezing point for six months of the year. Trees must be able to survive these low temperatures and also be able to make sufficient growth during the short, cool summer. Conifers have a thick bark and are evergreen, with tough needles instead of leaves. As the trees do not have to produce new leaves every spring, they can make a quick start to their growth when the melting snow provides moisture. The branches are fairly short and flexible. They bend in strong gales and also under the weight of the snow that remains throughout the year in the higher areas. In a coniferous forest trees grow close together and there is very little undergrowth. The ground is covered with fallen needles.

Some natural vegetation!