Amazon Rain Forrest
Many species of animals live in the Amazon Rain Forest. The rain forest itself, covering nearly 40 percent of South America, contains one in every ten species known on earth (“World’s” 1). Around 500 species of mammals, 475 reptiles, and one third of the world’s birds live in the Amazon. Although they all live in the same general area, animals have different habitats, diets, and life spans. A few of the many animals are the Scarlet macaw, Anaconda, Giant Amazon River Turtle, and the Howler Monkey. One of the many kinds of birds found in the Amazon is the Scarlet Macaw. Macaws are the largest parrots in the world, having a body from beak to tail that can be as long as 33 inches (Jukofsky 1). These particular birds can be found in Bolivia and in eastern Brazil. They spend the majority of their time in boisterous groups along rivers or atop of towering deciduous trees. In the holes of dead canopy trees, Macaws mate for life during the first couple of months of the year. Although these birds spend most of their time above, their diet consists of buts, leaves, seeds, and toxic fruits that could kill other animals; the amount of clay they intake neutralize the plant poisons (Jukofsky 1). These specific macaws are endangered because humans capture them and keep them as pets (“Scarlet” 1). On average, the macaw can live between 30 to 40 years (Goyal 1). In addition to the Scarlet macaw, another animal that lives in the rain forest is the anaconda. The anaconda is one of the largest snakes in the world, some being as large as 30 feet long. The eyes and the nostrils of the anaconda are on top of their head to help the snake see and breathe when most of its body is under water. The snake likes to spend most of its time in the water, but spends some time on the edge of the water on land. Their diets consist of large rodents, small mammals, frogs, birds, fish, and sometimes even deer (“Amazon” 2). There is no way to tell how long an anaconda is going to live. There have