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Life in Tropical and



                                                              Subtropical Regions                       20










             q   Life in the Amazon basin
             q   Life in the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin

            Introduction                                                        LIFE IN THE AMAZON BASIN

            The tropical and subtropical regions lie on both        The Amazon bain lies in the tropical region and
            sides of the Equator. The tropical region lies          covers almost half of the continent of South
            between 10°N in the Northern Hemisphere and             America. This valley has been formed by the rich
            10°S in the Southern Hemisphere. This region gets       soil brought by the Amazon River and its
            direct sunlight, and days and nights are almost         tributaries.
            equal throughout the year.
                                                                    Amazon River
            The subtropical region lies between 10°N and 30°N
                                                                    The Amazon River is the world’s largest river in
            in the Northern Hemisphere and 10°S and 30°S in         terms of volume of water that it drains. It is 6,556
            the Southern Hemisphere. This region lies close to
                                                                    km long. A large part of the river is navigable.
            the Equator and is influenced by sunlight to a great
                                                                    Together with its tributaries, about 900 in number,
            extent.
                                                                    its basin area is about 70,00,000 sq km, about
            We shall study life in the Amazon basin which lies in   50,00,000 sq km of which is covered with
            the tropical region and in the Ganga-Brahmaputra        rainforests. The basin of this river is the largest in
            basin which lies in the subtropical region.             the world. The Amazon basin expands over the

                                                VENEZUELA
                                                              SURINAME                                Alpine tundra
                                 COLOMBIA
                                                           GUYANA
                                                                                                      Equatorial rainforest
                                                                                                      Grassland
                                       Japu
                                                 i R o   Negro         Amazo  n
                                            ra                                      Belem             Chaparral
                          A
                  ECUADOR                                     Manaus     Santarem
                                Iquitos          Amazon
                            N
                                     zon                         Tapajos
                            P E R U  ma    F rua                           ingu X
                                            u
                                   A            Purus
                              D
                                                    Madeira          B R A Z I L
                 PACIF
                                                                                                            Recife
                                E
                    IC

                                  S
                                Lima                                                                  AT L A N T I C
                                                                                                        O C E A N
                                                                     Cuiaba
                                                  B O L I V I A                     Brasilia
                       OCEAN

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