Is There A Rainforest In West Virginia?
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- Опубліковано 23 вер 2024
- I continue my quest of finding rainforests in unexpected places by venturing deep into the mountains of West Virginia!
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www.dcr.virgin...
www.indefenseo...
www.usgs.gov/t...
www.asecular.co...
wvdnr.gov/wp-c...
wvtourism.com/...
wvstateparks.c...
livingatlas.ar...
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www.fs.usda.go...
link.springer....
Sorry about the apparent reupload from earlier today, what was posted was a mistake, an unfinished draft that still had some unfinished graphics. This is the final and proper version! Anyway, enjoy!
Oh, so you're telling me I have to watch this video again?!
Ok, fiiiiiiine. Stop twisting my arm. ;)
Honestly i didn't even notice
@@AtlasPro1 I noticed it one time, but immediately forgot about it afterwards.
I forgive.
Of course this video would get finished during what is likely the worst drought in WV history
What is difficult to see is that almost the entirety of West Virginia was strip-logged in the early part of the 20th century. I am 62 now, but when I was 8 or 9, the forests of most of WV looked pretty threadbare. I am pretty confident that most of what comprises the canopy of a typical WV forest now is very little like it was formerly. From what I remember being said by my great great grandfather, the forests were mostly white oak and everything else made up the understory. This change of composition does not change your statement that there is temperate rain forest biome in my home state, but I can only imagine the sort of diversity you might have found on your walk if it were 1824 instead of 2024. You might have even caught sight of a mountain bison or even an (original) eastern elk.
I think that American Chestnut would have been one of the dominant tree species in WV, as it would have been prior to the blight.
CathedralmSt. Park is the only stand of old growth forest in WV I know of and it's small. It wasn't logged due to a mapping error and wasn't assigned to any logging company.
@@tdude3212chestnut were only dominant in some areas. White oak dominance was the majority of the eastern forests.
@@TheRagingPlatypusThere is another stand of old growth at Gaudineer Knob, not far from Kumbrabow where this video was filmed.
Love hearing stories like this about how incredible and diverse the America’s were before not only the effects of colonialism but also the idustrial revolution and the ramifications it still has on us today. Its not something that’s talked about enough. Thank you so much for sharing!
As a North Carolinian, the southern Appalachians are some of the most beautiful natural environments that North America has to offer. They may not have the spectacle of the Pacific and interior ranges of the western US, Canada & Alaska, but the Appalachians have an "old" feeling to them which is fitting given how old the apps are, and standing in the thick of the forest or looking out on the canopy tops from a mountain gives the sense of something ancient or even magical in a way.
For the Tolkien nerds reading this, exploring the depths of the Appalacians has always made me imagine them like the Forest of Doriath, under the veil of Maiar magic from Melian. A deep mystique meanders through those woods in both a calming and unnerving way.
I agree. And well put.
Im also North Carolinian
The Tolkien nerdery is much appreciated. Love me some Beleriand 😍
Eh your statement shows what’s wrong with humanity. With the exception of rainy forests, most forests looked nothing like the 1800s or now because forest fire frequently renewed forests. Human settlement completely stopped forest fires and broke natures cycle for promoting a healthy forest. A real natural forests would burn several times in your lifetime, thus replenishing the soil and allowing new tree species to bloom.
@@zeitgeistx5239 fires also disproportionately take out younger trees. This is why a lot of older trees in the PNW are still dying despite protection efforts, because the prevention of fires means that younger trees with greater metabolisms are able to grow and outcompete older trees when grown near each other.
Ive stayed in WV for a couple years in college and was genuinely surprised by the forests in WV.
The state was renowned for the abundance of pinewood forests that once covered the Appalachian mountains but overlogging caused it to go extinct and so i was part of a volunteer group that planted hundreds of tree saplings to restore the former forests.
We need that where I live, too. Most "pine forest" that's left here are non-native tree plantations & the little bit of natural pine forest you do find now & again is pretty sad & threadbare in the biodiversity department. Up until pretty recently, the park services were actually funding a lot of studies because we'd decimated northeast Ohio so thoroughly, even they weren't entirely sure of what all was supposed to actually be here.
@atlasPro You already know this, but I just want to point out that your efforts are genuinely advancing the world's understanding of the planet we live on. Like, that's incredible and I hope you continue to keep up your hard work as well as enjoy it!!
@atlaspro1 My name is Jay Kaminski, I am a local PA ecologist with a Masters in Natural Resources, an obsession with biogeography, and a love for your channel! We do not have the quantity like WV or NC, but I can show you rainforests in the Poconos with rhodododendron understory just as thick, if not thicker than the NC or WV examples if you are interested. The Thornhurst tract of Pinchot State Forest is a great example, but it may be north of the last maximum glacial extent line. I am obsessed at finding remnant tracts of boreal forest that still exist in PA with red spruce, balsam fir haha, and also very big into GIS/map making so would definitely be interested in helping you map out some of these potential locations!
Also, I think the glacial extent line in your last map might be a little off and extend further southwest. For instance, I live right at the base of Red Rock Mountain which is the blue area to the west of the Poconos and I am pretty much right at the northern extent line.
Very nice video! It's weird seeing Rhododendrons being praised so much since they're an invasive species in large parts of Europe, but in it's natural habitat they really do look stunning.
I bet they are a big problem! Especially with their toxicity and innumerable, miniscule seeds
This comment sent me on a pretty interesting Wikipedia dive, since it's weird to think anyone could do anything when presented with a healthy rhododendron except love it.
And I guess the super invasive species in europe..... is european? The only one that popped up was apparently Iberian, and is invasive in the UK/Ireland. And there are other native rhododendrons in other parts of europe as well.
This feels like one of those "what do you mean your trash cans aren't constantly toppled by coyotes and raccoons?" moments. What's next? Never got pissed at a rattlesnake being a jerk and not leaving your garage?
true
and here is me, thinking there were only country roads there.
there were plenty of those too
@AtlasPro1 please do video on the savannas in Virginia and rainforests in Alaska.
😂
According to "Tumult of the Mountains" by Clarkson (1964) most of primeval forest of West Virginia was clear cut by 1929 and further destroyed by fires that spread through area. In some places the soil was urned down to the bedrock and has not recovered to this day.
Such a tragedy these beautiful lands are damaged and destroyed
You can find thick Rhododendrons where I'm from in Alleghany County, VA too. It's in SW VA on the border of WV. It gets thick here with plant life. The higher you go up the mountain, the more exotic looking plant life you can find that makes you feel you're in a rain forest. There are lots of different varieties of fish, animal, and bug life too. I've seen things deep in the mountains, in streams that I've never seen since. Tons of different salamanders too.
i noticed that rhododendron leaves looked very much like the leaves of labrador tea where i'm from in n.canada boreal forest. looked it up and they are, indeed, part of the rh family. the most wonderful use of these leaves once they've attained the brown under parts is as treatment for bug bites. (you may be aware of the joke that canadian mosquitos wear kevlar vests and ride harleys - it's true, they do.) a tea made from 1-2 leaves will cure burning, itchy bug bites. there's also a supposed repellent effect, but i can't attest to it.
since you're from around there, i'm wondering if you have any such use for the leaves of the big rh trees.
(excuse me for only typing rh instead of the full word but since i had a stroke, my typing requires very, very much fixing of typos)
@@vulcanfeline I don't use them. Maybe some people do. I've recently learned of many things here people use. We have stuff like shrooms and sassafras too people eat or make teas out of. There is probably a lot of stuff I don't know about like that.
It’s actually so cool seeing you go out and answer research questions that further humanity’s knowledge of biogeography. For a relatively underfunded and under-researched field, things like this really do make a big difference.
I’ve been through a small part of West Virginia on the way to Pittsburgh over the summer. It didn’t really rain, but it sure felt as dense as a rainforest! 🌳
One REALLY amazing place you should do a video on is Torreya State Park. It is a glacial refugia and has the highest number of tree species in the U.S. IDK if itd be considered a rainforest but it sure is an amazing place.
Looking forward to your Poconos trip! it's definitely interesting to find out that the main thing holding parts of the green mountains back from being a rainforest is the lack of soil, but also can't say I'm surprised - the cloud formations you showed from the top of white mountains were a familiar sight to me in my youth in VT , but I've never seen an understory like in these videos.
2 things.
1. Nobody is mentioning the pronunciation of Nantahala. I have only ever heard it pronounced like nanta-hey-la and this is how google pronounces it.
2. The map you show captioned "Areas in Appalachia that meet the climatic criteria of a temperate rainforest" shows some spots on the Cumberland plateau that meet the rainfall requirements for a rainforest. This may not technically be an actual rainforest(not sure), but I think you would be interested in it. There is quite a lot of mountain laurel, rhododendrons, and at least some salamanders around the big south fork national recreational area. Some parts definitely look like an Appalachian rain forest. I think some land around south Cumberland state park and frozen head state park also have similar features.
as a Pennsylvanian, I would very much be interested in a trip to the Poconos talking about this
You are definitely the most underrated UA-camr
So happy about this video! I'm a WV native and been a fan for a while now. So glad to see you explore wild and wonderful WV. The state has some true treasures that are not that well known.
Neighbor, Maryland here, we love camping in your state! Very friendly too!
Great video! Always love hearing about ecology and salamanders! The salamander that you couldn't identify in N.C. was a red cheeked salamander, which is a rainforest endemic. The redback salamanders in NC are a different species than the redbacks in WV, the southern redbacked salamander.
Also the one's you thought were springs salamanders were, by the black ridges by their nose. Also, the salamander you said was a longtailed salamander in W.V. was an allegheny dusky, as they occasionally look like that with the yellow. Cool finds none the less, would love to see more content revolving around salamanders or reptiles or other amphibians!
There are some areas of north New Jersey that might make the cut. I’m thinking about areas around West Milford, around where the glaciers came to a stop, where there are valleys full of mountain laurels, and I’ve seen many species of salamander.
I was just thinking that before you mentioned the poconos, there are trails on the Delaware water gap in both PA and NJ that absolutely meet the same criteria as a thick understory and high concentrations of amphibian life, even during your first video when you established the criteria I thought it could be considered. Definitely go there
Have you talked about Bermuda being the Northernmost tropics because coconut grow there and thats why Azores isn't tropical because no coconuts?
Presence of Coconut trees are a good determinating factor for if a humid coastal climate is tropical or not.
That is a very good topic I myself have considered many times before. Azores could possibly become tropical and support coconut trees in the next few years due to climate change.
Bermuda isn't the Northernmost tropical place. The Azores are tropical as it never gets below freezing. Except where it snows on high mountains like Pico.
@@Ululiona-Linulubruh😭
@@Ululiona-Linulusouth florida freezes and it is undeniably tropical. Thats not how it works
You should check out the Gippsland region of Victoria Australia or Southwest Tasmania. There's remnant Antarctic rainforest species, Dry Eucalyptus Woodlands, Alpine Highlands, and Grasslands all within a couple of hours drive.
A little longer of a trip ;-) But absolutely it'd be cool. I don't think there are any salamanders down there, tho!
So others have suggestions, but I have to add. If you have never visited the Hoh Rainforest and other surroundinf rainforests in Olympic National Park, you definitly should! You can hike along the Hoh River, visit the Olympic Hot Springs, and check out Mt. Stormking while you're there. Some people also consider the forests on the western side of the Cascades are Rainforest as well, which means an excuse to get out to Mt. Rainier, the North Cascades, and Mt. St. Helens.
Watching the vid again to boost it in the algorithm :)
Yes! Another rainforest excursion video. Hope you find one even further north.
Wilkes Barre Pennsylvania is my hometown just outside of the Poconos. Lots of moutain laurel here as soon as you head in either direction out of the valleys
I spent weeks in Pocahontas and Greenbrier Counties taking a geology field camp class in order to get my geology degree. I can attest to the fact that the rhododendron and laurel were a serious PITA for geology students trying to find rock outcrops.
The Poconos and Laurel Highlands in PA are probably the best spots to find a temperate rainforest North of West Virginia.
Hey Atlas Pro! So I've been visiting the Pocono Mts. from my home in NY for about 30 years now (Have a house there) and I can confirm that a lot of the top soil has been moved away from something (Probably glaciers). There are lots of bare rocks exposed in the area and I haven't seen much of what clasifies as an understory in terms of flora. The most I have come across are a lot of ferns, and small shrubs. Although salamanders are pretty common there, I haven't seen a range of species like what you saw in WV. Now this is all in part because I "MAY" be above that glacier line in the Poconos, so maybe you'll find something different further south. Exactly where that line ends I don't know. But I wish you luck in your search though!
The west coast of BC has rain forests and it arrears to be covered in glacier maximum. might be interesting to explore how these areas got their soil back.
i just finished the video about rainforests in New York a few days ago it feels crazy that this is out now lol
Hi, big salamander guy here. The salamander you thought was a spring salamander in North Carolina is probably a red salamander. Great video, love the content.
If you want to see high elevation rainforest in southern Appalachia, go the smokies and you’ll environments you might find in Canada.
As a native West Virginian, I was delighted to see my home state featured on one of my favorite channels. I visited Kumbrabow State Forest every year growing up at summer camp, and while I always knew it was a magical place I never realized it was a full blown rain forest! I watched the full video with my sons (4 and 2) who were fascinated by the salamanders. Thank you for visiting our state and hope you find occasion to come back again soon!
That's not accurate rainforest can't exist where glaciers were. There is the Great Bear Rainforest in Canada, which is the largest Temperate Rainforest in the world.
And the tongass rainforest in Alaska
I think because the east has most of its heaviest rain right on mountains, it probably is not possible for rainforrests on the East Coast, but Alaska probably has quite a few cause its probably lower altitude and has more soil to work with.
Mountains already aren't particularly known for deep soils.
@@Radnugget the mountains in Alaska with shallow soil still support the temperate tongass rainforest
There are tons of areas like that in the Alleghenies in West Virginia and even up into Maryland. If you’re keen to explore more, Blackwater Falls State Park is a great place to look, as well as bits of Dolly Sods, the Falls of Hills Creek, Gaudineer Knob, and even potentially Swallow Falls in Maryland and Coopers Rock near Morgantown. Cathedral State Park has an area of Old Growth (unlogged) forest, and from what I hear the forests before logging had massive trees and giant amounts of peat. If you can, look up the history of Dolly Sods-I think that would be both a confirmation of the rain forest ecosystem of the area and potentially the reason (heavy logging and post logging peat fires) that the rain forest is not well known. It’s also interesting to note that there are several ski resorts in that part of West Virginia that take advantage of the increased precipitation which can fall as snow in the winter.
Living in NC all my life and never knew about our rain forest!
Awesome!
I was gonna say that the Poconos could be a rainforest. Thanks for including that at the end. Very similar climate to what you described. Rhododendron everywhere.
Might not be a good time to come to Carbon County as we've been in a drought for the past few weeks though.
I remember looking at a Forest ecology map based on temperature and rainfall years ago for Florida. To my surprise not only was there parts of the Florida Panhandle that exceeded the 55" threshold for a rainforest (its still considered humid subtropical though) but that a small smudge within Fort Lauderdale qualified as a tropical rainforest.
This is pre-Zaslav Discovery Channel material. Good work!
Imagine how great the temperate rainforest was before the Industrial Revolution! The biodiversity of trees and plants thanks to the help of the carrier pidgeon, Carolina parakeet esc. Elk, wolves, cougars, more bears. More salamanders. Unbelievably huge chestnut trees. So sad we couldn’t see it at its peak diversity
video's like this make me kind of jealous, here in the Netherlands we don't have a lot of ancient forest. and we certainly don't have a lot of places with rocks or cliff faces however small. and obviously no mountains be seen here. and it just baffles me that you just drive 8 hours, with an 8 hour drive i would be in the black forest in Germany.
I live just a few miles from Sequoia National Forest. While it doesn't get enough rainfall to classify as a rainforest, the Sequoia trees obviously need a huge amount of water. They get a lot of it from the fog/clouds that shroud the park much of the year. It's probably a similar amount of water that you find in these other places, it just doesn't fall as rain. Let me know if you ever want to check out the Sequoias!
iNaturalist mentioned❤❤❤
I love these forest exploration/explanation videos! Would be interested in seeing a deep dive on the Redwood forest in Northern California as well! Keep up the excellent work :)
Can you do a video on Earth's past supercontinent's? Like before Pangea?
New Englander, as someone who has attened the NASCAR race at pocono 5-6 times and taken multiple different scenic road trips to get there, I remember in 2019 driving there I felt like we were driving in the middle of nowhere and couldnt believe how dense the woods were. Not to mention, theres always a solid downpour no matter what month this race is. I would definitely pay the poconos a visit.
Would love to see a Poconos exploration with it being practically my home turf :)
The Tongass in Alaska and Great Bear Rainforest in British Columbia, are forests with lots of their area being officially considered rainforest.
It's in a region You'd expect to have been covered by glaciers during the ice age, so I'm curious if it's just labeled rainforest due to it's rainfall, or manages to support a proper rainforest ecology.
... Not that I'd expect you to go all the way to Alaska or BC to look at them.
I love this video! Feels validating to know can call these areas rainforests. I always had such a hard time describing to friends that the forest is just different there.
I'm from WV but grew up near the Poconos.
I remember one summer camping my brother woke up with a salamander inside his sleeping bag. Those buggers are everywhere in the Poconos!
I get more excited about new Atlas pro videos than I do ANY MOVIES EVER. Havent even watched yet but I'm pumped!
Huh? I got a notification about 4 hours ago about this video, but was made private about 20 minutes later.
I managed to sneak in a view just before it went private.
I saw it, but watching another video. When that video finished I went to atlas pro channel and this video wasn't there anymore. Does someone knows what has changed?
original video went private. So i guess he now uploaded an updated version of the video.
Reupload
I absolutely enjoy driving through these places, it's nice to see what's there on foot as well.
Southeast Alaska has temperate rainforest and from what I understand, they were covered by Glaciers, they actually still have a number of glaciers there.
it's very rare i see my state covered like this, this video was very pleasant
Technically speaking, a glacier did reach into the Cranberry Glades in eastern WV. There are plants and bugs there that are native to Canada ❤
As a lifelong Appalachian resident of the Alleghenies, and have spent countless months in the Adirondacks and Southern Appalachians. I would venture to say the unique watershed structure of much of the Alleghenies and southward probably extends the range of “Temperate Rainforests” across the Alleghenies, Cumberlands, and Blue Ridge Mountains beyond the climatic requirement. So are these truly rainforests, per definition no, but these pockets where creeks and streams converge receive as much if not more than the minimum requirements of water to fulfill the requirement of temperate rainforest. Some PA examples include Cook Forest State Park, Detweiler Run and Alan Seeger Natural Areas (both in Rothrock State Forest), and many pockets within the Allegheny National Forest and Susquehannock State Forest. And if you are using Salamanders as a gauge of temperate rainforest PA holds just as many if not more species of the Great Smokies, including unique species such as the Allegheny Dusky Salamander.
Rhododendrons are WV's state flower for a reason.
I love this focus on trying to find overlooked Micro climates. I like the part that talked about the understory. I live in NW Oregon and i bet you would love to explore our remaining Old growth temperate rainforests. There are pockets of lesser know old growth patches around here. BTW I'm impressed with the salamander diversity over there. I don't think we have as many different kinds of salamander or newts like we saw in this video. We have them but i mostly find a bunch of only a couple types
I think it would be a great idea to do a video on the Poconos
I’m really loving this series on rainforests and I love your other content, you’ve come a long way and produce amazing content thank you Atlas Pro
Your graphic is covering BC but there definitely is rain forest beneath areas that you show as glaciated.
Great Bear, right? And north of it is the Tongass in Alaska.
They are in the area that was under glaciers during the last Ice Age, so they might just be areas of "climactic" rainforest, rather than supporting an understory, but I'm curious about them. I've never been in that area, so I can't say anything with certainty.
Wow - what a great video! Thank you for this - love all the salamander goodness!!!!
If rhododendrons and mountain laurel makes a rainforest, then a whole lot of the Pennsylvania mountains are covered in rain forest
The Great Smoky Mountains is a temperate rainforest as well as the Blue Ridge Mountains of Western NC in general. But from what I saw it doesn’t meet Alaback’s criteria of forest fires being infrequent and not an important role in the ecosystem because I heard that forest fires there are not necessarily rare even though they aren’t anywhere near as common as in California but I heard they do play an important role in the ecosystem there. So I have a question do they follow or use another definition or criteria to classify the Great Smoky Mountains and Western NC as temperate rainforest? Make a video about that too
As a Pennsylvanian from Appalachia (Central not Northeast tho)
It would be really cool if you did a video on the Pocano Mountains
I absolutely love this series! Do you thing that it's possible that there is a rainforest in the very far northwestern corner of Montana? I know that the area gets a lot of rain but I'm not sure if it gets enough for a rainforest.
Hi, Atlas Pro! I have spent quite a lot of time in the Southern Appalachian Temperate Rainforests, and I have to push back on your criteria for temperate rainforests. Instead of a robust understory, I would argue that an abundance of epiphytes is better measurement of a temperate rainforest. Here in the southern Appalachians, the understory is comparable to the understories in neighboring deciduous forests. However, these forests are cloaked in an assortment of mosses, ferns, and liverworts. Some pockets in the Great Smoky Mountains have trees draped in long threads of green moss. Also, the Smokies aren't the only temperate rainforest in the southern Appalachians. Aside from the high peaks that capture moisture, the Blue Ridge Escarpment (much lower in elevation) is even rainier (over 120 inches of rain annually!). This is because a series of southeast-facing gorges catches rain from the Gulf of Mexico. On a different note, if you want another perspective on temperature rainforests, you should look at the Encyclopedia of the Biosphere's volume on temperate rainforests.
I live in the Poconos, while there are areas with an understory I wouldn't consider it a rainforest as many places have little/poor topsoil....you can 'grow' rocks. Additionally, we have had on-and-off droughts the last decade+, and we have only had 1 day of measurable rain this month. You could come visit the Cranberry Bog in Tannersville which is the southernmost boreal bog east of the Mississippi River.
I'd love to see you visit the Poconos; also, you might want to take a look at the strips of blue in Virginia on your map. It won't be as lush as what you found in WV and NC, but is definitely worth checking out.
I am loving these videos on rainforests. It would be super cool to see you explore further afield, if you have the means. My home (I’m away at college now) is in the country’s largest temperate rainforest, the PNW!
Really love how you spot pointed the various northeast Montana chains
The Poconos have native rhododendron for sure. In the areas north of Stroudsburg and east of Tannersville I'd say it looks pretty similar to the WV rainforest you've displayed.
Interesting how flipping rocks in New York works better because there is no understory and therefore less leaves to hide under 12:57
My thoughts on this were that because the forest floor is more moist, salamanders can persist away from the cover of rocks for much longer, making them harder to find only by flipping over rocks. Here in New York the floor dries out more frequently and so they’re more often found taking refuge under rocks.
i think what you identified as a ravine salamander was actually a blue spotted salamander, either way cool find!
Those salamanders are beautiful! What a great journey, thanks for sharing.
Very very beautiful places! I really hope you can keep exploring them and showing a bit of these wonders of nature
itd be really cool to see fish biodiversity being considered, especially since the darters of the regions you visited are incredible little river fish.
Great video! Love Western North Carolina. I studied Biology at Western Carolina university. My class went on a trip to the Nantahala forest at night where we captured and released Salamanders. Found one Salamander eating another. 😁
This guy flew to a play to check it out just to spend time and gas driving back to stay longer? Now that's the kind of commitment I respect!
Babe wake up, atlas pro just posted!
(i am lonely)
Best win for one of my favorite UA-camrs since The Tim Traveller witnessed the first San Marino victory in a competitive football match.
10 minutes in i got hit with a 50 minute long documentary about saving a tribe in Brazil. I watched it all. Forgot what the video was about and had to restart it. 10/10
Not true that rain forests cannot exist where glaciers once were. I can take city bus to one that does! (North Shore of Greater Vancouver, BC, area). It all depends on what the glacier did (they can deposit material as well as scrape it away). The Quinault Valley in Washington State was also once glaciated and is a rain forest (Lake Quinault was carved by a glacier).
Amazing video like always. Now that the place is getting more attention, I think it is a great opportunity to push the conservation efforts to preserve the rainforest and possibly connect the fragmented lands.
Nice cover for your salamander obsession!
The appalachians sure are rainy
Sometimes. I grew up near the WV border in SW VA, and it rains a lot in the mountains, but sometimes you get a couple weeks or more with no rain. There is definitely a diverse plant, animal, fish, bug life here and the plant life can get thick at times where it's hard to walk through the woods.
Not this year...
Great conclusion. The beauty of learning is you can never learn it all. I would love to see that Poconos trip bud. Coral reefs of unexpected location a would be fun one too.
@13:06 Gemini identified it as a Jefferson Salamander
You're actually missing a step with the glacier thing. What those glaciers also did was remove earthworms from the glaciated region long enough for plants there to re-evolve to handle soil conditions without earthworms breaking down forest detritus naturally. Between that & Natives actively working with the land in different ways than Europeans caused a situation, up until European contact, where northern forests naturally had extremely thick, loamy soil that was almost like store bought potting soil. Europeans not only introduced earthworms, we slaughtered the natural forests, all that soil washed out & they never recovered quite the right way again. It's even more confusing, given that the way the forests were back then was also largely due to Native American influence on the land, so we actually don't really know what a natural northern Eastern Woodlands is really supposed to look like at all, or whether what Natives did would technically be a better way to go.
Unlikely that plants evolved for the soil conditions in such a short time. More likely that plants already suited to post glacial soil conditions moved in as the ice sheet receded.
I never thought of my home island of Taiwan as having rainforests. However, all the criteria for a rainforest, such as having significant understory, and moisture from the forest forming its own clouds, you mentioned match pretty much the entire island. I guess most of Taiwan just isn't a tropical rainforest, but a rainforest nonetheless.
Next: Oceanic Rainforests! 1- They have the rain. 2- Did not get covered in glaciers. 3- They have (kelp) forests.
"That's what I'll be looking to see when I touch down"
Probably gonna see a runway and airport, honestly.
So so so so underrated. I love research channels like these!
Imagine if West Virginia changes from Coal to the American rainforest tourism sector.
That's the dream!
@AtlasPro1 Laurel Ridged ain't named that for nothing. You gotta check that out down in Somerset county, PA. I also noticed on your map the rainfall is very high. And would snowfall count for the matter? One of the snowiest places in the state, far more than the Poconos.
I looked into it already! It sure looks like a piece of Appalachian rainforest, but it's a little further south than the Poconos, which are RIGHT on the edge of the last glacial maximum. Still looks like an awesome place to visit!
60 in of rain? That's cute. Sorry, I live in the northwest. LOL Love your channel
West Virginian here i never thought that a "rainforest" would be here considering its all mountains here but anyways good video
Especially now that the drought has really taken the rain away this year...
In Florida there’s a tropical one