These mainly coastal forests have a special 'oceanic' climate, which is very wet and mild, due to landscape and warm ocean currents. Hands up who knows about lichen? The map below shows just how rare it is. The key areas include the West Coast of Scotland, Snowdonia, Devon, Cumbria and Northern Ireland. In addition, some temperate forest animals eat lichens, including flying squirrels and deer.
It is a habitat which is globally rare and some say is more threatened than tropical rainforest. Lichens can grow on any number of surfaces, both living and inert, but they are most noticeable on the trunks of trees. Buckle up.
Lichen is actually a life-form that is the result of an inter-dependent relationship between two very different organisms; usually a fungus and an algae, (or a cyanobacteria, a common occurrence in the lichens lower down in the rainforest strata).
While biologists are still not exactly sure what the true dynamics of the relationship are, generally speaking the algae usually provides the food through photosynthesis, while the fungus provides protection from the elements as well as mineral nutrients. Tropical Rainforests .
Tropical rainforests are the lungs of the earth. The areas where conditions for this habitat thrive in the UK are along the western seaboard. One of the main things that characterises temperate rainforest is its lichen, and in this respect Scottish rainforest is hyper significant.
They are similarly common in the Australian rainforests, from the micro lichens that look like paint on the tree trunks, to the splashes on every leaf (right), to one of the most recognizable groups of macro-lichens, the 'Old Man's Beards', One of the most recognizable groups of macro-lichens is the Old Man's Beards which are bunches of stringy material hanging down from branches. Large Flying Fox.
The large flying fox (Pteropus vampyrus) is one of the largest species of bats in …
Lichens can grow on any number of surfaces, both living and inert, but they are most noticeable on the trunks of trees.
A lichen is a cryptogram.
Temperate rainforest around the world. Credit: Wikimedia. The heat, high humidity, and unpolluted air allow lichens to flourish in the tropical rainforest of Far North Queensland in Australia. The moist, cool air of the temperate rainforest helps support many different types of plants and animals.
It rains every day and tropical rainforests can get as much as 400 inches of rain each year. The result is a very successful and diverse group of organisms that can inhabit habitats all over the world, including some of the harshest environments on the planet.In the tropical rainforests, different types inhabit different zones in the rainforest, as can easily be observed by examining a typical trunk with it's different colours at different levels (left). The heat, high humidity, and unpolluted air allow lichens to flourish in the tropical rainforest of Far North Queensland in Australia. Common Examples of Tropical Rainforest Plants Some of the tropical rainforest plants are pineapple, pepper, palm tree, orchid, fern, peanut, orange, lemon, coffee, banana and avocado. No one?