The Fer-de-lance strikes without warning, and its bite is often fatal to humans.  It is found in South and Central America and various islands of the West Indies, often near sugar plantations.  During the day the snake lies coiled, blending with its surroundings, but it's especially dangerous after sunset, when it wanders in search of prey.  The Fer-de-lance has a thick, reddish brown body.  It has a tapering tail that ends in a hard point.  It has a black stripe that runs from each eye to the neck, and its sides may be bright red.  The snake is usually about  5 ft long, but may grow to more than 7 ft. 

The boa constrictor is one of the largest snakes in the world, ranging in size from 10 to 14 feet long.  The boa is very large, but the anaconda in South America is larger.  Most boa constrictors live in Guiana and Brazil.  Boas defend themselves by striking.    The boa is a constrictor, which means it wraps around its prey tighter and tighter until their prey dies.  Whenever its prey breathes out, the boa wraps tighter.  After the prey has been constricted, the boa eats it whole.  Boas eat mice and rats, and occasionally a small deer. To eat bigger things (like deer), they stretch their mouths very wide by unhinging their jaws.  It can take several weeks for the boa to fully digest its food.     Boa constrictors vary in color from brown to gray.  A large female can give birth to as many as 50 young!  Boas use heat pits to sense their surroundings, because they have bad eyesight. 

The anaconda is an amphibious snake.  It gives birth to live young.   Some anacondas, which live in the water, can reach up to 30 feet in length!  The anaconda is most active at night.    Although they are not venomous, they defend themselves by inflicting severe bites, but kill by constriction.  They swim well and kill their prey by strangling them.  If that does not work, they drown them.  They are usually able to last two years without eating.  They feed on birds and small animals.  They will kill animals as large as jaguars.    The anaconda is the largest snake in the world.  This snake is in the boa family.  It is found in stream banks and swamps in South America, east of the Andes from Columbia and Venezuela to Northern Bolivia, and South Central Brazil.  There is little known about the anaconda.   

A: Every animal has the ability to protect itself from being someone's next meal. Each species has evolved with its own set of unique adaptations, ways of helping them to survive. BLENDING IN The coloring of some animals acts as protection from their predators. Insects play some of the best hide-and-go-seek in the forest. The "walking stick" is one such insect; it blends in so well with the palm tree it calls its home that no one would notice it unless it moved. Some butterflies, when they close their wings, look exactly like leaves. Camouflage also works in reverse, helping predators, such as boa constrictors, sneak up on unsuspecting animals and surprise them. The three-toed sloth is born with brown fur, but you would never know this by looking at it. The green algae that makes its home in the sloth's fur helps it to blend in with the tops of the trees, the canopy, where it makes its home. But green algae isn't the only thing living in a sloth's fur; it is literally "bugged" with a variety of insects. 978 beetles were once found living on one sloth! STAYING OUT OF SITE The sloth has other clever adaptations. Famous for its snail-like pace; it is one of the slowest-moving animals on earth. (It can even take up to a month to digest its food!) Although its tasty meat would make a good meal for jaguars and other predators, most do not notice the sloth as it hangs quietly in the trees, high up in the canopy. ARMED AND DANGEROUS Other animals want to announce their presence to the whole forest. Armed with dangerous poisons used in life-threatening situations,their bright colors warn predators to stay away. The coral snake of the Amazon, with its brilliant red, yellow, and black coloring, is recognized as one of the most beautiful snakes in the world, But don't admire its beauty too long; its deadly poison can kill within seconds The poison arrow frog also stands out with its brightly colored skin. Its skin produces some of the strongest natural poison in the world, which Indigenous people often use for hunting purposes.Another animal with no friends is the hoatzin. Often called the stinkbird, it produces a horrible smell to scare away potential predators.

The perfect partnership - Azteca ants live on the Swollen Thorn Acacia Tree, which offers the ants everything needed for survival - lodging, water, and food for themselves and their young. In return, the ants protect the trees from predators. Whenever the ants feel something moving at the foot of the tree, they rush to fiercely fight the intruder. They also protect it from vines and other competing plants that would otherwise strangle it. As a result, nothing can grow near these trees. They are the only trees with a built-in alarm system!

RAINFOREST BIRDS

PRIMATES Bolivian Gray Titi Dusky Titi Monkey Ebony Langur Golden Lion Tamarin Gorilla Lemurs Long-Tailed Macaque Macaque Orangutan Proboscis Monkey Squirrel Monkey Wied's Tufted-Eared Marmoset Woolly Monkey CATS Jaguar Ocelot OTHERS African Forest Buffalo African Forest Buffalo Agouti Babirusa Bat Bearded Pig Capybara Coatimundi Elephant Giant Anteater Giant River Otter Malayan Tapir Okapi Sloth Sumatra Rhino Tapir Wild Boar

The tallest trees are the emergents, towering as much as 200 feet above the forest floor with trunks that measure up to 16 feet around.   Most of these trees are broad-leaved, hardwood evergreens. Sunlight is plentiful up here.  Animals found are eagles, monkeys, bats and butterflies. CANOPY LAYER This is the primary layer of the forest and forms a roof over the two remaining layers.   Most canopy trees have smooth, oval leaves that come to a point. It's a maze of leaves and branches.  Many animals live in this area since food is abundant.   Those animals include: snakes, toucans and treefrogs. UNDERSTORY LAYER Little sunshine reaches this area so the plants have to grow larger leaves to reach the sunlight.   The plants in this area seldom grow to 12 feet.  Many animals live here including jaguars, red-eyed tree frogs and leopards.  There is a large concentration of insects here. FOREST FLOOR It's very dark down here.  Almost no plants grow in this area, as a result.  Since hardly any sun reaches the forest floor things begin to decay quickly.  A leaf that might take one year to decompose in a regular climate will disappear in  6 weeks.   Giant anteaters live in this layer.

Because there are so many creatures living in the rainforest, there is a great deal of competition for food, sunlight and space. Some animals became very specialised. This means that they adapted to eating a specific plant or animal that few others eat. For example, parrots and toucans eat nuts, and developed big strong beaks to crack open the tough shells. Leafcutter ants climb tall trees and cut small pieces of leaves which they carry back to their nest.The leaf pieces are about 50 times their weight.The ants bury the leaf pieces, and the combination of the leaves and the ants' saliva encourages the growth of a fungus, which is the only food these ants eat. Sometimes there are relationships between animals and plants that benefit both. Some trees depend on animals to spread the seeds of their fruit to distant parts of the forest. Birds and mammals eat the fruits, and travel some distance before the seeds pass through their digestive systems in another part of the forest. One problem with specialisation is that if one species becomes extinct, the other is in danger too unless it can adapt in time. The dodo, a flightless bird of Mauritius, became extinct in 1681. Today there are just 13 calvaria trees left on the island, each over 300 years old, and nearly at the end of their life. Scientists realised that the seeds had to pass through a dodo's digestive system before they could germinate. It seemed that the tree species would also become extinct, but scientists tried domestic turkeys and have successfully managed to germinate some seeds.Many rainforest animals use camouflage to 'disappear' in the rainforest. Stick insects are perfect examples of this. There are some butterflies whose wings look like leaves. Camouflage is of course useful for predators too, so that they can catch prey that hasn't seen them. The Boa Constrictor is an example of a camouflaged predator. The South American three-toed sloth uses camouflage and amazing slowness to escape predators. Green algae grows in the sloth's fur, which helps camouflage it in the forest canopy. Sloths are among the slowest moving animals of all (inside too, as it takes about a month to digest food). They hang from branches in the canopy, and are so still that predators such as jaguars don't see them. Some animals are poisonous, and use bright colors to warn predators to leave them alone. There are several species of brightly colored poison arrow frogs. Native Central and South American tribes used to wipe the ends of their arrows onto the frog's skin to make their arrows deadly

Many species of animal life can be found in the rain forest. Common characteristics found among mammals and birds (and reptiles and amphibians, too) include adaptations to a life in the trees, such as the prehensile tails of New World monkeys. Other characteristics are bright colors and sharp patterns, loud vocalizations, and diets heavy on fruits. Insects make up the largest single group of animals that live in tropical forests. They include brightly colored butterflies, mosquitoes, camouflaged stick insects, and huge colonies of ants. The Amazon river basin rainforest contains a wider variety of plant and animal life than any other biome in the world. The second largest population of plant and animal life can be found in scattered locations and islands of Southeast Asia. The lowest variety can be found in Africa. There may be 40 to 100 different species in 2.5 acres ( 1 hectare) of a tropical rain forest.   When early explorers first discovered the rainforests of Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, they They were amazed by the dense growth, trees with giant buttresses, vines and epiphytes . The tropical vegetation grew so dense that it was difficult to cut one's way through it. It was thought at the time that the soil of a rainforest must be very fertile, filled with nutrients, enabling it to support the immense trees and other vegetation they found. Today we know that the soil of the tropical rainforests is shallow, very poor in nutrients and almost without soluble minerals. Thousands of years of heavy rains have washed away the nutrients in the soil obtained from weathered rocks. The rainforest has a very short nutrient cycle. Nutrients generally stay in an ecosystem by being recycled and in a rainforest are mainly found in the living plants and the layers of decomposing leaf litter. Various species of decomposers like insects, bacteria, and fungi make quick work of turning dead plant and animal matter into nutrients. Plants take up these nutrients the moment they are released. A study in the Amazon rainforest found that 99% of nutrients are held in root mats. When a rainforest is burned or cut down the nutrients are removed from the ecosystem. The soil can only be used for a very short time before it becomes completely depleted of all nutrients.

Besides these four layers, a shrub/sapling layer receives about 3 % of the light that filters in through the canopies. These stunted trees are capable of a sudden growth surge when a gap in the canopy opens above them. The air beneath the lower canopy is almost always humid. The trees themselves give off water through the pores (stomata) of their leaves. This process, called transpiration, can account for as much as half of the precipitation in the rain forest. Rainforest plants have made many adaptations to their environment. With over 80 inches of rain per year, plants have made adaptations that helps them shed water off their leaves quickly so the branches don't get weighed down and break. Many plants have drip tips and grooved leaves, and some leaves have oily coatings to shed water. To absorb as much sunlight as possible on the dark understory, leaves are very large. Some trees have leaf stalks that turn with the movement of the sun so they always absorb the maximum amount of light. Leaves in the upper canopy are dark green, small and leathery to reduce water loss in the strong sunlight. Some trees will grow large leaves at the lower canopy level and small leaves in the upper canopy. Other plants grow in the upper canopy on larger trees to get sunlight. These are the epiphytes such as orchids and bromeliads. Many trees have buttress and stilt roots for extra support in the shallow, wet soil of the rainforests. Over 2,500 species of vines grow in the rainforest. Lianas start off as small shrubs that grow on the forest floor. To reach the sunlight in the upper canopy it sends out tendrils to grab sapling trees. The liana and the tree grow towards the canopy together. The vines grow from one tree to another and make up 40% of the canopy leaves. The rattan vine has spikes on the underside of its leaves that point backwards to grab onto sapling trees. Other "strangler" vines will use trees as support and grow thicker and thicker as they reach the canopy, strangling its host tree. They look like trees whose centers have been hollowed out. Dominant species do not exist in tropical rainforests. Lowland dipterocarp forest can consist of many different species of Dipterocarpaceae, but not all of the same species. Trees of the same species are very seldom found growing close together. This bio diversity and separation of the species prevents mass contamination and die-off from disease or insect infestation. Bio diversity also insures that there will be enough pollinators to take care of each species' needs. Animals depend on the staggered blooming and fruiting of rainforest plants to supply them with a year-round source of food.

There are four very distinct layers of trees in a tropical rain forest. These layers have been identified as the emergent, upper canopy, understory, and forest floor. Emergent trees are spaced wide apart, and are 100 to 240 feet tall with umbrella-shaped canopies that grow above the forest. Because emergent trees are exposed to drying winds, they tend to have small, pointed leaves. Some species lose their leaves during the brief dry season in monsoon rainforests. These giant trees have straight, smooth trunks with few branches. Their root system is very shallow, and to support their size they grow buttresses that can spread out to a distance of 30 feet. The upper canopy of 60 to 130 foot trees allows light to be easily available at the top of this layer, but greatly reduced any light below it. Most of the rainforest's animals live in the upper canopy. There is so much food available at this level that some animals never go down to the forest floor. The leaves have "drip spouts" that allows rain to run off. This keeps them dry and prevents mold and mildew from forming in the humid environment. The understory, or lower canopy, consists of 60 foot trees. This layer is made up of the trunks of canopy trees, shrubs, plants and small trees. There is little air movement. As a result the humidity is constantly high. This level is in constant shade. The forest floor is usually completely shaded, except where a canopy tree has fallen and created an opening. Most areas of the forest floor receive so little light that few bushes or herbs can grow there. As a result, a person can easily walk through most parts of a tropical rain forest. Less than 1 % of the light that strikes the top of the forest penetrates to the forest floor. The top soil is very thin and of poor quality. A lot of litter falls to the ground where it is quickly broken down by decomposers like termites, earthworms and fungi. The heat and humidity further help to break down the litter. This organic matter is then just as quickly absorbed by the trees' shallow roots

In some cases both species are so dependent upon each other that if one becomes extinct, the other will as well. This nearly happened with trees that relied on the now-extinct dodo birds. They once roamed Mauritius, a tropical island located in the Indian Ocean. They became extinct during the late 19th century when humans overhunted them. The calvaria tree stopped sprouting seeds soon after. Scientists finally concluded that, for the seeds of the calvaria tree to sprout, they needed to first be digested by the dodo bird. By force-feeding the seeds to a domestic turkey, who digested the seeds the same way as the dodo birds, the trees were saved. Unfortunately humans will not be able to save each species in this same way.

The constant search for food, water, sunlight and space is a 24-hour pushing and shoving match. With this fierce competition, you may be amazed that so many different species of animals can all live together. But this is actually the cause of the huge number of different species.The main secret lies in the ability of many animals to adapt to eating a specific plant or animal, which few other species are able to eat. Have you ever wondered, for instance, why toucans and parrots have such big beaks? These beaks give them a great advantage over other birds with smaller beaks. The fruits and nuts from many trees have evolved with a tough shell to protect them from predators. In turn toucans and parrots developed large strong beaks, which serves as a nutcracker and provides them with many tasty meals.

Each species has evolved with its own set of unique adaptations, ways of helping them to survive. Every animal has the ability to protect itself from being someone's next meal. The following are just a few of these unique and often bizarre adaptations. CAMOUFLAGE The coloring of some animals acts as protection from their predators. Insects play some of the best hide-and-go-seek in the forest. The "walking stick" is one such insect; it blends in so well with the palm tree it calls its home that no one would notice it unless it moved. Some butterflies, when they close their wings, look exactly like leaves. Camouflage also works in reverse, helping predators, such as boa constrictors, sneak up on unsuspecting animals and surprise them. SLOW AS A SNAIL The three-toed sloth is born with brown fur, but you would never know this by looking at it. The green algae that makes its home in the sloth's fur helps it to blend in with the tops of the trees, the canopy, where it makes its home. But green algae isn't the only thing living in a sloth's fur; it is literally "bugged" with a variety of insects. 978 beetles were once found living on one sloth! The sloth has other clever adaptations. Famous for its snail-like pace; it is one of the slowest-moving animals on earth. (It can even take up to a month to digest its food!) Although its tasty meat would make a good meal for jaguars and other predators, most do not notice the sloth as it hangs quietly in the trees, high up in the canopy. DEADLY CREATURES Other animals want to announce their presence to the whole forest. Armed with dangerous poisons used in life-threatening situations, their bright colors warn predators to stay away. The coral snake of the Amazon, with its brilliant red, yellow, and black coloring, is recognized as one of the most beautiful snakes in the world, But don't admire its beauty too long; its deadly poison can kill within seconds The poison arrow frog also stands out with its brightly colored skin. Its skin produces some of the strongest natural poison in the world, which Indigenous people often use for hunting purposes. Another animal with no friends is the hoatzin. Often called the stinkbird, it produces a horrible smell to scare