SchoolsEstela RomeroJanuary 04, 2021

DO FORESTS PRODUCE THE RAIN?

SchoolsEstela RomeroJanuary 04, 2021

THE VISIT

With this group, we shall close the series of visits to the fantastic student-audience from the “Aporo” county belonging to the flat lands and forest areas at the hillsides to “Sierra Chincua” Sanctuary. They have been an enthusiastic large group altogether with their local teachers. The topic to close with in this visit, was extremely important for children, teachers and their families to understand: “Do our forests produce the rain?”. Most people, (at least in our region), believe that trees generate water by themselves. Well, this is not really quite so and this is what Estela exposed in the lesson: “If we did not get rain from the sky, the earth, our planet, would simply dry out. Fortunately, during the summer we get thick and heavy clouds coming from the oceans. “F r o m t h e O c e a n s ???, --children shouted in chorus not believing this!--. “See: waters in the ocean evaporate and form clouds; these clouds get pushed by the air, reaching the nearest in-land forest regions, then “breaking” and releasing all the water in them at a given moment! This is how it rains!!!; however, there are countries, towns and cities that are too far away from the oceans for these clouds to hold water for such a long way where they are located!; Well, It is necessary that between the oceans and these regions a forest lane, a forest connection, exists; every rain event occurring in forests close to the sea will produce vapor clouds upon the forest itself, the air will push them inland and it will rain in the nearest forest areas to the former ones!; there, water will condense once more and clouds will be formed again to be pushed by the air currents onto the following closest forest areas raining again there! and so on all along the forest connections in-land from the ocean to the farthest tropical forest or whatever forest types on earth, as long as this forest-lanes are dense enough to attract such cloud-condensation; it depends on how much rain we get in the summer that water will be enough to store underneath the ground for us to nourish our natural wells, springs and superficial and underground rivers!. Summarizing: Forest trees are “calling” the clouds formed far away in the oceans! this is how important trees are!. The thicker our forests, the more it will rain in our region, the healthiest and more powerful our rivers, the more our water storage, the healthiest our ecosystem in general! —Estela concluded for children to shower with questions to themselves and to their own classmates… “What if Monarchs come here to overwinter so ancestrally also because of our ancestral rivers?”, --a a boy in the class wisely inquired--. “Oh, but wait that I need to tell you: when I was a child your age, forty years ago, rivers would be so impressively powerful… they would carry 3 to 5 meter-height of brave water currents… unfortunately, for some years now, some have disappeared in our area within only 20-30 years… this is really concerning… what do you think we could do to revert this situation?” –Estela asked--. “C o n s e r v e o u r f o r e s t s!” --the whole group responded in chorus. Estela showed a few photos with local rivers hardly carrying some water reflected with children on how short a raining time we have had this past summer, and how warm a winter we are having now, which could seriously affect Monarchs and our whole local ecosystem.