Talk:Tropical rainforest/Archive 1

?
it says in the first paragraph that Tropical Rainforests produce 40% of the world's oxygen, but then in the next paragraph it says that Tropical Rainforests are oxygen neutral, producing little or no oxygen! ??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by121.222.188.149 (talk) 04:07, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism
Manually reverted vandalism by 96.224.198.195 at 23:31, 4 January 2008. Noted user page. =UseUrHeadFred (talk) 09:11, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Someone has just complained that I vandalised the 'Tropical Rainforest' page. I DID NOT, Until today when I came on it to leave this message I've never even been on the page! I am a bit concerned to have been accused of vandalising a page like that. Skekayuk 21:53, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

_
I am doing a massive edit on this article. DO NOT edit for at least an hour. User: (talk • contribs) 18:47, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Okay. I'm done with major editing. You can edit it once more. User: (talk • contribs) 19:36, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Split
Some of this article may refer to "tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests" as the main topics rather than the rainforest, but it shouldn't. Background: This article (Tropical rainforest) was moved to Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests for a while, and then that article was split in two, with half of it going back here (tropical rainforest). "Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests" is a broader topic, of which "tropical rainforest" is only a part. Some old talk would be found in Talk:Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests. Please help keep the differences between these topics clear. Cheers. —Pengo 21:11, 17 March 2007 (UTC)


 * I've removed a lot of material on a single specific ethnic group that makes some use of rainforest from the "Human uses" section. While I'm sure it was all perfectly accurate it is also only very tangential to the subject at hand. In addition a full paragraph on one single ethnic group is way overboard. If we included a similar amount of material on the literally thousands of other ethnic groups that make some use of rainforests worldwide the article would be a mess. Everyone has thier favourite group or other hobby horse, but if we can't do justice to all, or at least a representive sample, there is neither purpoise nor fairness in delving into fine detail on one.


 * I suggest the contributor starts a new artciel to detail that ethnic group. Such anthropological/religious detail doesn't belong in what should be an ecology article, IMO anyway. 203.164.198.193

Organisms
In the tropical rainforest many species o plant are existent. These include - Bromeliads: Closely related to the pineapple family, can catch rain water in a bowl held in by their thick waxy leaves. They can hold several gallon of water and nurture mini ecosystems. - Epiphytes: Also called air plants, epiphytes are found on the trunk, branches, and even the leaves of a tree. Epiphytes include cacti, lichens, ferns, and orchids.

- Saprophytes: These are the rainforest's decomposers. Most are microbes, and not visible to the naked eye.

- Buttress Roots: Additional support that branches out from the base of a trunk of the tree.

- Lianas: Lianas are a type of climbing vine found mainly in tropical rainforests. Once they reach the top of the canopy they often branch off to other trees or twist themselves around other lianas. This network of vines gives support against strong winds to the top-heavy trees.
 * the last statement is incorrect. Liana are a structural parasite which are more likely to cause damage/death to trees. Furthermore - this network of vines means that when a tree does go there is an increased likelihood of it taking other with it.Sepilok2007 (talk) 07:24, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Conservation
I deleted the section on conservation. The section contained no information, just a link to an extremely poorly written article on "Rainforest Conservation".Ethel Aardvark 00:35, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Plant Adaptations
Plant Adaptations You might consider adding a small section on Plant Adaptations. This may be a lot of work but it is often some of the more sought after information when researching rainforests, also its a real pain to have nothing on Wikipedia about it. :)

External Links / Conservation Efforts
How about adding Cool Earth? It's the website of a charity that allows you to sponsor rainforest, a half-acre at a time, so that they can protect it against logging. Logging would have the effect of releasing carbon into the atmosphere and so contribute to global warming.

Unregistered users are currently blocked from editing this page; please could an established user add this for me? Cheers! 218.79.193.143 03:08, 2 July 2007 (UTC)


 * If this website is making claims that "Logging would have the effect of releasing carbon into the atmosphere and so contribute to global warming" then I won't be adding it because it is demonstrably not reputable. That claim is a load of bollocks. Logging of rainforest actually increases carbon sequestration. It is clearing of rainforest that increases atmospheric carbon. and cleairng =/= logging.. Ethel Aardvark


 * Forgive me for mixing up "logging" and "clearing". I guess you guys have already checked the website for yourselves by now but for the record...
 * ...the website does not say that cutting down the rainforests for timber (logging) contributes to global warming. It does, however, talk about other environmental damage caused by logging, such as species destruction, which it also aims to prevent by buying up rainforest. I guess they chose the name 'Cool Earth' because 'Cool, diversely populated, holding-promise-of-many-more-cures-for-disease Earth' wasn't catchy enough :o) 15 mins 16:06, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Map
The distribution map seems to be somewhat lacking. If it is to be believed then there is no tropical rainforest on the Australian continent, none in Polynesia, none in Southern Africa, None in the central and Southern Andes and on the Indian subcontinent it is restricted to Bangladesh. The ommisions are glaring and as it stands the map contradicts the distribution range given in the article.Ethel Aardvark 06:40, 20 August 2007 (UTC)


 * ? A search reveals no mention of those areas within the article. So where is the contradiction? Vsmith 00:05, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Standardisation
We need to standardised name within this article e.g. rain forest vs rainforest under story vs understory (or understorey) Sepilok2007 (talk) 07:15, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Climate change Peat & Siberia
Not sure what the relavence of the new addition is. I think you probably mean tropical peatswamp forests are major carbon sinks, not all TRF. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sepilok2007(talk • contribs) 12:14, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

This page currently uses the term rainforest - should it be changed to tropical rainforest throughout so as not to confuse this info with temperate rainforests? Would a section at the top saying "this is tropical, for rainforests in general go here" be better? Kea2 (talk) 21:18, 29 August 2008 (UTC)657

fast facts
someone keeps reverting my fast facts section that I keep putting at the end of the article! Who is it and who wants me to put it back? —Preceding unsigned comment added by70.181.105.160 (talk • contribs) 15:47, 18 May 2008
 * Your fast facts are unsourced and unneeded - the material is in the article if important. Vsmith (talk) 22:03, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Someone added fast facts with a few random words underneath. I didn't see the point in it, and reverted.  Thegreatdr (talk) 21:33, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Which fact is true?
With respect to the percentage of the world's animals and plants in the tropical rain forests, is it 50% or 66%? Please note the 2 different references in this article:

"Rainforests are home to half of all the living animal and plant species on the planet.[2]"

"Rainforests are home to two-thirds of all the living animal and plant species on the planet."

Is it safe to assume that the cited passages are the most accurate such as in this case?

24.6.152.197 (talk) 23:43, 27 July 2008 (UTC)celerygreen, user

In what way is "Human uses: Conversion to Agricultural Land" unbalanced
Can someone tell me how that section is unbalanced so that I can attempt to correct the imbalance. What information or POV has been neglected? What do you think needs to be added?Ethel Aardvark (talk) 09:51, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I would like to ask what the definition of the tropical rainforest is....
As it is important to the conservation--202.173.190.40 (talk) 02:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, it's tropical. It has rain. And it is a forest. Anyway, read the article.  Simon  \\  KSK  Yes we can! 02:16, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

What I mean is a standard classification base on documentation —Precedingunsigned comment added by 202.173.190.40 (talk) 04:57, 19 January 2009 (UTC) Otherwise, my view of a tropical rainforest may not be agreed by others--202.173.190.40 (talk) 04:59, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I just found one but I'm not sure if it's official http://nzdl.sadl.uleth.ca/cgi-bin/library?e=d-00000-00---off-0ccgi--00-0--0-10-0---0---0prompt-10---4---0-1l--11-en-50---20-about---00-0-1-00-0-0-11-1-0utfZz-8-00&cl=CL2.5&d=HASHb91de0211405a241159393.2.4>=1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by202.173.190.40 (talk) 05:08, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

When I search the google scholar, I only found this

http://scholar.google.com.au/scholar?as_q=tropical+rainforest+classification&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=title&as_sauthors=&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=

However, I did find this

http://rainforest-australia.com/Tropical_Rainforest.htm

http://rainforest-australia.com/Australian_Tropical_Rainforest.htm

Wish I could find the above info from a government website, hey? —Preceding unsigned comment added by202.173.190.40 (talk) 05:18, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I also explored this

http://scholar.google.com.au/scholar?hl=en&lr=&q=allintitle%3A+rainforest+classification&btnG=Search

and found most of the classification are focused on foliages. What about animal habitats? Can they be used for classification as well? --202.173.190.40 (talk) 05:37, 19 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I've article-linked the words 'rainforest' and the +/-28 degrees to identify what these mean.87.194.150.80 (talk) 04:03, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I love bananas — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.46.204.152 (talk) 17:31, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Spelling
"Academic resoruces" in this article is misspelled and needs to be corrected.Sparkal2526 (talk) 14:53, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Yup, done. Thanks, Vsmith (talk) 16:05, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Bananas are the bomb

"Arctic snowforest"
Somebody ban the fool who changed this article to opposite terms. —Preceding unsigned comment added by69.90.51.138 (talk) 05:27, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

800px-tropical wet forests.png
Is there not a large part of the Amazon missing from this diagram, specifically south of the Amazon Basin? Or that area classified differently to tropical rainforest? Zarcadia (talk) 16:21, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

More vandalism
Why does this talk page attract so much vandalism? It's almost the only thing happening here... MuDavid(talk) 14:26, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from 94.98.241.150, 27 July 2010
غابة إستوائية

94.98.241.150 (talk) 04:03, 27 July 2010 (UTC)


 * The code already exists in the article. Bejinhan  Talk   04:28, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Different information
The first part of the article says that: Minimum normal annual rainfall between 1,750 millimetres (69 in) and 2,000 millimetres (79 in) occurs in this climate region. Mean monthly temperatures exceed 18 °C (64 °F) during all months of the year.

Under Characteristics it says: The temperature ranges from 15 (59°F) to 51°C (122°F) and 125 to 660 cm of rainfall yearly.

The information seems to be different. 173.183.115.196 (talk) 10:44, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Link overdose
Wow, WAAAY too many pointless links in this article. Do we really need a link to shrubs? And sometimes it gets flatly misleading- rainforest???

What's the point of all these links?

Kielbasa1 (talk) 06:41, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

only according to some scientist
"Tropical rainforests are unable to support human life" this is only according to some scientists, many believe that it is indeed possible to live a hunter-gatherer life in tropical rainforest, so i'm gonna change it to according to some scientists Tropical rainforests are unable to support human life. — Precedingunsigned comment added by 80.62.20.190 (talk) 15:44, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Can you provide any refercne for this claim thatit is only some scientists? If not I am going to revert this to reflect the information in the references. Mark Marathon (talk) 10:37, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Possible citations for some scientists suggest that Tropical rainforests are unable to support human life would be: Kirk Endicott and Peter Bellwood (1991) The possibility of independent foraging in the rain forest of Peninsular Malaysiahttp://www.springerlink.com/content/v66g61m053780126/ Serge Bahuchet, Doyle McKey and Igor de Garine (1991) Wild yams revisited: Is independence from agriculture possible for rain forest hunter-gatherers? http://www.springerlink.com/content/tt1087413l0v433k/ I have only read the abstracts, but have downloaded the wild yam one and can send the pdfs if anyone wants to read the whole thing

Complete revision of page's outline
I am part of a class where my professors have challenged us to revise various wikipedia pages concerning topics in our class. My group and I have been assigned the tropical rainforest page. We understand that tropical rainforests is a rather broad topic and that wikipedia already has three pages dedicated to this: tropical rainforest, rainforest, and Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forest. As a group we felt that there is a need to re-organize this page to better match the format of other biome wikipedia pages. We would also like to combine information from the other pages similar to tropical rainforest to make this page more comprehensive.

We would like to format the page with 7 sections: Introduction, Description (subsections: Natural History, Types of trop. rainforest, forest structre), Ecology (subsections: Soils, climate, carbon flux), Geography, Flora & Fauna (subsections: Flora, Fauna, Biodiversity & Speciation), Human Dimensions (subsections: indigenous peoples, resources, research), Conservation (subsections: threats, conservation efforts).

We also understand that there are existing pages for many of these topics above and they will be linked accordingly.

Our time to edit this page and finish our project is limited. If there are any requests/concerns about our editing and formatting please let us know - we are more than willing to be part of this editing community. Gazelle13(talk) 16:37, 17 November 2011 (UTC)Gazelle13


 * Hi Gazelle13! I've moved your comment to the bottom of this page because the norm on Wikipedia discussion pages (like this one) is that the later messages go near the bottom rather than the top of the page. Also, you mentioned that you're part of a class where your professor has asked you to revise some Wikipedia pages - could you let me know what university you're at? I'm not sure whether you or your professor are aware of the Wikipedia U.S. Education Program, which provides various Wikipedia support resources (including in-person and online Wikipedia mentorship) to classes that are editing Wikipedia as coursework. If you or your professor are not aware of this, please let your professor know - if s/he is interested in joining the program, I can try to connect him or her with our support resources either this semester or next semester. Thanks!Annie Lin (Wikimedia Foundation) (talk) 19:44, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Good on you for improving this article, it badly needs it. However you deleted the entire well referenced section on human habitation and replaced it with less well referenced, ambiguous, contradictory material for no apparent reason. While it may come as a surprise to undergrads that rainforests can not sustain human life, those are the facts. Removing this and replacing it with information on people who live as agriculturalists within deforested rainforest patches supplemented with hunting within the remaining forest is  considered bad form. By all means add more information on such people, but please don't just remove the existing information. Mark Marathon (talk) 08:09, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you for catching our mistake. My group and I are certainly not interested in deleting already referenced entries on this site.  We are new to this site and are still learning how to contribute.  We apologize for loosing your entries as we uploaded ours.  Your views on the sustainability of human life in the rainforest are interesting and certainly brings further perspective to the study of anthropology in rainforests.  We are certainly not anthropologists and are only attempting to make this article more complete.  As for our previous edits onto this Wikipedia article, we realized our mistake of uploading our unfinished entries and are currently in the process of changing many of our errors.  Thank you for your patience with our edits to this page.Gazelle13 (talk) 00:10, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I have a few issues with these edits that you are making.
 * 1)	You state that “Net primary productivity… can be defined as the amount of carbon retained in plant biomass over time”, and reference Cleveland and Townsend. Yet I can find no such definition in Cleveland and Townsend. Can you please tell me what page and paragraph I might find this definition in? I query this because the definition is at odds with the definition that I have been using professionally for over 20 years. According to your definition a forest that is being heavily browsed by animals has a lower NPP than an identical unbrowsed forest because less of the carbon is retained in plant biomass. This despite the fact that more carbon is fixed annually in the browsed forest. Taken to its most extreme, this definition says that the primary productivity of an Iowa cornfield is less than that of the Mjoave desert, because virtually none of the carbon fixed in the cornfield is retained in plant biomass over time, while almost all of that in the desert is. Does this seem reasonable to you? The more usual definition of NPP is gross photosynthesis minus autotrophic respiration. The amount of carbon that is retained in plant biomass is quite irrelevant, so long as it isn’t oxidized by plant tissues. Yours is not a usage of NPP that I have ever seen, so I have to question your source.


 * 2)You also claim that “[NPP] is used to measure the amount of carbon within a rainforest.” Are you sure about this, and can you provide a reference. How exactly can NPP be used to measure the size of carbon pool? Since you previously defined NPP as “the amount of carbon retained in plant biomass over time”, how can measurements of NPP account for the soil carbon pool, for example, which is ~8x larger than the plant biomass pool?


 * 3)In the same section you claim that “Carbon flux can be defined as the exchange of carbon dioxide between the atmosphere and a sink”. According to the IPCC an exchange between a source and the atmosphere is also a carbon flux, so I would be interested in seeing a reference for this definition of a flux? Do you dispute that fluxes can also occur between atmosphere and sources?


 * 4)You state that “The importance of rainforests in the carbon cycle depends on the above and below ground (root systems and soil organic matter) biomass…” Can you please provide a reference that soil organic matter is considered biomass? Isn’t biomass mass stored within living organisms? Given that all the literature I have seen gives a figure of ~60% of soil carbon in the form of non-living detritus, humus etc, is it really accurate to describe soil carbon as “below ground biomass?” Even your own statement later in the article Is that only 27% of the soil carbon pool is biomass: roots, microorganisms, soil fungi and plants.


 * 5)You state that “The importance of rainforests in the carbon cycle depends on the above and below ground (root systems and soil organic matter) biomass, amount of carbon stored, and the rate at which it is fixed by plants through photosynthesis”, once again referencing Cleveland and Townsend, and once again I can not find any such definition in Cleveland and Townsend. Can you please give us the page an paragraph in which this definition appears? I question this because such a standard of importance seems so simplistic as to be erroneous. What about factors such as the rate of flux or the form of mineralization? By this standard a swamp forest emitting 10t/ha/day of methane has the exact same impact on the carbon cycle as a monsoon forest that is producing 1t/ha/day of charcoal, provided both forests will have the same biomass and the same carbon fixation rate.


 * 6)Finally, we come to the issue that spurred me to check this section. You claim that “tropical rainforests are known to be significant carbon sinks absorbing 4.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year”. This is the claim that I placed a {{fact} tag on previously. You have removed the tag, but I can see no reference for this claim, much less the specific number of 4.8 billion tones annually. There is currently great controversy concerning whether rainforests are in fact net sinks or sources, so I was surprised to see someone blithely asserting that rainforests are sinks.


 * 7)You then claim that “the rainforests of Amazonia contain between 14 and 40 kilograms of carbon per square meter and the soils contain 27% of the carbon in roots, microorganisms, soil fungi and plants.” Once again referencing Cleveland and Townsend, and once again I can not find any such claim in Cleveland and Townsend. Can you please give us the page an paragraph in which this definition appears? I can’t find any mention of Amazonia or 27% in the article.


 * Anyway, this has taken far longer than I wanted to devote to it. However considering that these apparent errors have all shown up in a brief perusal of 5 sentence paragraph, I am somewhat concerned that the multi-page edits that you have made to the rest of the article contain a similar error:information ratio. I hope you can put my mind at ease and convince me that a similar level fact checking isn’t going to be required for all the edits that you have made. I have to say that my biggest concern is that the citation that you have provided do not in fact seem to support the statements that refer to them. Thanks for your time. Mark Marathon (talk) 14:28, 2 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I've removed the carbon flux section as Gazelle13 hasn't responded. Vsmith (talk) 12:58, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I was going to give them another couple of days. I figured two months at this time of year was a reasonable time to correct errors. Way to jumo the gun. ;). On a more serious note, the number of errors in this short sectio0n does not bode well for the accuracy of the huge number of other changes they made. I personally don't have time to review every single section to this degree. I wonder whether it's worth simply checking one or two other sections, and if they are equally erroneous, simply revert all edits by Gazelle13 on the assumption that everything they posted was wrong? — Precedingunsigned comment added by Mark Marathon (talk •contribs) 21:40, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Seems the editor was doing a class assignment - and class is over, they haven't edited since 1 Dec. I would agree that if other sections of their edits have similar problems, it will probably be better to return the page to the state prior to their "class project" work. I've seen other "Wikipedia assignments" by students with rather poor results - seems the teachers are maybe too "disconnected" to care about the quality of their students work (or the reflection on their school). As for this article, I have no subject matter expertise or access to (offline) references to review much. Vsmith (talk) 00:23, 31 January 2012 (UTC)