Marcin Legeżyński Living Near the Rainforest is Fascinating

My name is Joshua and I am 13 years old. I live in a village on Luzon Island. Luzon is in the Philippines, a country in Southeast Asia. Our island is almost completely covered by rainforestrainforestrainforest. A rainforest is a thickthickthick forest found in many areas around the equatoraround the equatoraround the equator. It is home tois home to [be home to]is home to many animals and plants, some of which are still unknown to science. In 2014 and 2015, researchersresearchers [researcher]researchers found 381 new species in the rainforest. Sometimes, we visit the rainforest with my younger brother. It is a great place to be in as long as you know enough about how to stay safe. For example, you mustn’t touch some of the plants as they may be poisonouspoisonouspoisonous. Also, some insects and animals may be dangerous to humans. After all, it is their natural habitathabitathabitat, not ours, and we are only visitors here. The trees form a green canopycanopycanopy, so there is very little sunlightlittle sunlightlittle sunlight in some parts of the rainforest below. The canopy layerlayerlayer is where most animal and plant speciesspeciesspecies live, and where 90% of the sunlight goes. It’s usually at the height of 15‑30 metres above the ground. It is not, however, the highest part of the rainforest. Over the canopy, more than 30 metres above the ground, the tallest trees form the emergent layeremergent layeremergent layer. Some of them can be as tall as 50 metres! The middle layer of the forest, just under the canopy, from 2 to 15 metres above the ground, is called the understoryunderstoryunderstory. It consists of leafyleafyleafy bushesbushes [bush]bushes, small trees, saplingssaplings [sapling]saplings, and vinesvines [vine]vines. The plants that grow here usually have large leaves. This helps them catch as much light as possible, as the understory layer only gets 5% of the rainforest’s sunlight. The forest floorforest floorforest floor is a very dark, dampdampdamp, and hot place. This lowest layer only gets 2% of the sunlight. It can be 2 metres tall and it is here that you will find some of the biggest animals living in the forest. My brother and I often take photos of interesting parts of the rainforest. We then share them with friends at school. Sometimes, our teacher discusses the photos we take in our biology class. That always makes me so proud! I would really like to become a scientist in the future and explore all the interesting facts about the wildlife of the rainforest or work to protect the species living there.

1 Źródło: Marcin Legeżyński, licencja: CC BY-SA 3.0.