Question

What do you think is a forest?

Answer 1

Biology consists of several aspects and all of them are mostly found in our surroundings like biodiversity, nature, forests, different species of plants and animals, biomes and our ecosystem.

Complete answer:
A large area of land completely covered with different species of trees is known as a forest. According to the Food and Agriculture organisation forest is a land of more than 0.5 hectare having a canopy of more than 10 % and the tree height more than 5 meters. Land under commercial/urban use or agricultural use doesn’t come under forests. They account for 75% of the earth’s gross primary productivity and 80% of its biomass.
Forests provide habitat to a number of species of animals, birds, and insects. Several rare medicines are also found in the forests. Deforestation has increased these days to bring the land covered by the forest to some use for human beings like for industrialization, construction, farming, mining and many more. Different types of forests are found on our planet –
-Coniferous forests – These forests are found in the eastern Himalayas and have trees that bear cones like pine, spruce and fir.
-Deciduous forests – These forests are found in the Western Ghats and trees of teak, sheesham, amla, sal are found here.
-Mixed forests - Have trees of both coniferous and deciduous forests. Such forests are found in the mountainous regions.
-Mediterranean forest – They are found in Southern parts of India and have trees of short oaks and pine. Insect eating birds are found here and a huge range of wildflowers too.
-Tropical Rainforests – Andaman and Nicobar islands have such forests. These forests cover large areas in South America, Australia and Africa. They are known as the lungs of the earth and are a habitat of billions of species of flora and fauna, some of them have yet to be discovered.

Additional information: Forests cover more than 30% of the Earth’s surface but due to deforestation this percentage is declining.
Russian federation has 815 million hectare area under forests, followed by Brazil (497 Million hectare).
In India Arunachal Pradesh has the maximum area under forest cover.

Note: Amazon is the largest forest on our planet which is a home of many incredible species of plants and animals and due to increasing temperature is prone to forest fires now and then.