Forests play a hugely significant role on planet Earth. They act as "Earth's lungs." (WWF, n.d.) These "lungs" purify the air trapped in the atmosphere and are positively involved in the daily lives of all living things. However, the environment's harmful cigarette, deforestation, permanently removes the forest cover from an area and transforms that previously forested land to other uses. Deforestation is the primary cause of losing these valuable forests and it is occurring at an unimaginably rapid pace. According to the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF), "The lungs of the planet are increasingly being likened to those of a heavy smoker." (WWF, n.d.) Specifically relating to deforestation, there is a rare rainforest that is known as the "largest coastal temperate rainforest on the planet." (The Nature Conservancy, 2014) This rainforest is 6.4 million hectares and it stretches along the coast of British Columbia. (Bethel, 2014) It is the Great Bear Rainforest. It has a variety of grizzly bears, salmon, and timber trees. However, deforestation in the ecosystem of the Great Bear Rainforest has resulted in the adverse environmental impact of biodiversity loss to bear, fish, and plant, species.
“The Great Bear Rainforest is home to over 2,500 salmon runs.” (Temple, 2005) At the moment, the Pacific salmon is the evident species inhabiting the forest. Salmon are keystone species. This means that they play a vital part towards the ecosystem together as a “critical food source for many wildlife species and as an upstream vector in the distribution of marine-deprived nutrients through the forest.” (David Suzuki Foundation, 2005) When this forest gets cut down, the entire ecology of the nearby water bodies drastically changes in a negative m...
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...ase-stress-in-grizzly-bears-linked-with-salmon-shortages/)
Spirit bear competition (http://www.isfoundation.com/news/creatures/spirit-bear) http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/canada/placesweprotect/great-bear-rainforest.xml (this is for the intro) http://www.newsroom.gov.bc.ca/2014/01/great-bear-rainforest-milestone-reached.html (FOR INTRO 6.4 MILLION HECTARES)
VISUALS:
1. Percentage diagram of clear cutting in the Great Bear Rainforest (Beside biodiversity loss of plant species paragraph) (from DSF source)
2. Percentage diagram of fish protection (beside or near the fish paragraph) (From DSF source)
3. From the ground up - cirle diagram of stats/percents of entire forest (goes near intro)
4. Salmon map (Salmon for Parks Chris T. Darimont et al.
Figure 2 )
http://www.raincoast.org/wp-content/uploads/SalmonforParks_Oct2010Darimont_etal.pdf
Forests cover 31% of the land area on our planet. They produce vital oxygen and provide homes for people and wildlife. Many of the world’s most threatened and endangered animals live in forests, and 1.6 billion people rely on benefits forests offer, including food, fresh water, clothing, traditional medicine and shelter (drug war facts, Page 1).
Pinkish in color, with spots on their eight fins and back, thin long body with an average weight of 23 kg and length up to 76 cm, and a distinct back fin called the adipose fin. They are saltwater fish which spawns in fresh water, travelling over 20,000 kilometers in the ocean with speeds of up to 50 km per hour. They can jump more than four meters to climb waterfalls and any obstacles they encounter in the water. The Northwest Salmon is one miraculous fish. However, Northwest Salmon are now on the verge of being protected under the Endangered Species Act due to their dramatic decline in their population in the Northwest region of the United States. Their declines in numbers are causing great problems for their surrounding ecosystem, those that rely on the salmon as a food source, and the fishing industry. All of which humans are contributing to all these by overfishing, either commercial or for sport, and the construction of dams on major rivers. Then with the attempt to fix this problem, fisheries, or farms for fish, end up genetically changing the fish and making them more vulnerable to predator fish. Predator fish that are nonindigenous to the rivers the salmon swim in. Eating the salmon’s food or in most cases, eating the salmon themselves. If all of these acts continue at full force, I predict that the Northwest Salmon will not be naturally running up and down our American rivers within the next 50 years if not everyone is totally aware of their situation.
Deforestation is the clearing of a forest and/or cutting down of trees for human benefits such as agriculture, wood exports, etc. Deforestation is the cause of numerous environmental impacts such as habitat loss, flooding and soil erosion. It can also cause climate change, by reducing the amount of rainfall and changing the amount of sunlight reflected from Earth’s surface and increases the risk of forest . Tree growth is important for biodiversity because they absorb carbon dioxide which is a harmful greenhouse gas . However, since deforestation reduces natural carbon sinks, it disrupts the balance between oxygen and carbon dioxide in the air causing the amount of carbon dioxide in the air to increase. This poses a serious threat since carbon dioxide traps the sun’s heat and radiated light inside the earth’s atmosphere. So, with the increase in carbon dioxide more heat is trapped and thus adding to the effects of global warming. Among the many places where deforestation takes place, Amazon seems to be one of the most affected ones. More than 20 percent of it is already gone, and much more of it is severely threatened due to deforestation . It is estimated that the Amazon alone is vanishing at a rate of 20,000 square miles a year .
They show the three different habitat zones, forest, transition, and farmland. The graphs are done over a 30 year time period that shows the abundance of wolf, coyote, and foxes in the three habitats. The year to year change was observed between coyotes and foxes while being influenced by the presence of wolves. The time frame was the independent variable while the population of the three populations was the dependent variable. In figure 1B they show that for a while the fox and coyote population was all over the place because wolves were being hunted and then in 1996 wolf hunting started to slow down and the population of foxes and coyotes started to stabilize. In figure 1C they show that in the transition habitat the populations are all increasing over time until about 2004 when the fox population fell below the coyote population. In figure 1D they show what happens in farmlands where wolves are not present. Coyote populations are pretty low compared to the fox population until sometime between 1996 and 2001 where things dramatically changed and the coyote population was way higher than the fox population. In figure three they made a food web that shows that wolves negatively affecting coyotes. Then coyotes negatively affect foxes. This could be due to niche overlap and competition, by the wolves negatively affecting coyotes they are positively affecting
One of the most predominate ecosystems is the forest community. Covering about one-fourth of the land area on Earth, forests consist mainly of trees and other woody vegetation, growing closely together. The trees can be large and densely packed, as they are in the coastal forests of the Pacific Northwest, or they can be relatively small and sparsely scattered, as they are in the dry tropical forests of sub-Saharan Africa. Forests are complex ecosystems that also include “soils and decaying organic matter, fungi and bacteria, herbs and shrubs, vines and lichens, ferns and mosses, insects and spiders, reptiles and amphibians, birds and mammals, and many other organisms” (Audesirk, 2003). All of these components constitute an intricate web with many biological interconnections. A bird may depend on the upper branches of a tree for nesting, while the tree may depend on the fungi surrounding its roots to obtain water and nutrients. A forest performs a number of vital environmental services, such as cleansing the air, moderating the climate, filtering water, cycling nutrients, providing a habitat for animals and provides humans with recreation and beautiful scenery. Resources from the forest supply raw materials, such as lumber, paper products, greenery and pharmaceuticals. Some of the developing issues today concerning forests are fires and what we as a society can do to restore the natural ecosystems within the forests around our world. Many aspects are to be considered when looking at the ecology and bioremediation of forests such as, human activities, wildlife, endangerment and environmental changes. This paper will discuss the effect wildfires have on the forest ecosystem.
b) Logging has impacted this special ecosystem. There are trees that are hundreds of years old and their timber is being pushed to be sold for high prices. After World War 2 the Australian economy was booming and timber was in demand. A number of timber mills where made near the Daintree for the purpose of cutting down the forest for the use in infra...
The salmon population faces many threats and obstacles on their journey to the sea and humans try to help them along the way. The major goal in the salmon’s journey is to keep them alive to make it to the sea. This can be extremely hard because of their bad habits they acquired in the hatcheries. In the hatcheries the salmon would come to the surface of the water when it was time to eat. If a salmon comes to the surface of the water on their journey to the sea there is an increased change that they will become a bird’s food instead of them eating. Another problem salmon face is the dams. Before the dams were built, the salmon population could face the current and it would carry them to the sea. However, with the dam in place the salmon have
On average millions of hectares of forests are destroyed each year resulting in severe consequences that will affect not only our lifestyle, but also all the animals with which we share our planet. Many species of animals and plants will become extinct and if we continue with the destruction of our forests, earth will be unable to sustain life.
Environmental issues affect every life on this planet from the smallest parasite to the human race. There are many resources that humans and animal needs to survive; some of the most obvious resources come from the forests. Forests make up a large percentage of the globe. The forests have global implications not just on life but on the quality of it. Trees improve the quality of the air that species breath, determine rainfall and replenish the atmosphere. The wood from the forests are used everyday form many useful resources. Moreover, thinning the forests increases the amount of available light, nutrients and water for the remaining trees. Deforestation (forest thinning) is one of the most critical issues of environmental problems that are occurring today.
Salmon have an extremely crucial role to play in their ecosystem as they are a keystone species. A keystone species refers to a type of organism which an ecosystem largely depends on. If they became extinct or disappeared, the ecosystem would change drastically. The pilgrimage salmon will attain to reach their place of origin is extremely life-threatening, and scarcely any will arrive at the destination. Salmon are the nourishment many animals feed on, and they are also a vital element in plants.
life is essential to life on earth as it produces much of the oxygen that is
Rainforests once covered 14% of the worlds land surface, however now it only covers a mere 6%. It is estimated that all rainforests could be consumed in less than 40 years. Trees are becoming more needed and used everyday. We need them cut down for many reasons such as paper and timber, while also needing them ‘untouched’ for other reasons like oxygen, we have to ask ourselves, which is more important? At the current rate, most of the rainforests are being cut down for resources like paper and timber, but less importance is being placed on main resources like oxygen.
But they can become carbon sources when they are cut or burned. Tropical forests hold more than 210 gigatons of carbon and deforestation represents around 15% of greenhouse gas emissions. These GHG emissions lead to rise in temperatures, weather changes, water changes and increase the chance of extreme weather events. In Sumatra, for example rainforests on deep peat lands are being cleared and converted to plantations, leading to the high GHG emissions in Indonesia. These climate changes can affect forest creatures due to loss of food and water, while some can adapt species losses can occur
since the beginning of time. Man has been destroying trees for the use of wood for
One of the most evident problems associated to the environment is the issue of the logging of trees, mainly in undisturbed places such as the Amazon basin. Trees are considered the lungs of the Earth. They recycle all the polluting carbon in the air and return oxygen back into our atmosphere, creating a stable cycle of carbon in our atmosphere. However, the impeccable rates which trees are being cut down in our forests have grown to ever increasing and alarming rates. Trees that are made way for farming are burnt up releasing deadly amounts of carbon and thus leading to the problem of global warming. As its names suggest the world is slowly warming up and without any notice the environment which God has gave us will be slowly eradicated. The daily lives which humans carry on about every day are also a factor influencing on our environment and global warming. By driving cars that have a thirst for petrol we are releasing carbon dioxide and furthermore impacting on the world?s climate. In Australia environmental impact has always been evident. Land clearing especially in places such as Queensland has caused land to lay dry and lifeless where all forms of life is destroyed. By clearing land we are not only affecting our climate but are also destroying animal habitat and the usage of the land. Senseless actions by commuters in Australia, emitting tons and tons of lethal gases vulnerable to the atmosphere are starting to take its toll on our climate. We are seeing a harsher climate and at the same time less rain. If we want to preserve our world we must take a stance on this issue and take action for what is right, not carrying on the actions that will lead to a desolate, destroyed Earth.