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164 points bikenaga | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.221s | source
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htamas ◴[] No.45399285[source]
The Amazon forest is unique in many ways but most importantly because unlike other forests, it CANNOT grow back. The reason for this is that it is a leftover from when the planet was covered in rainforests because it was a lot warmer and wetter in the Eocene epoch. The forest is sustained by the rain it creates from itself. Once the trees are gone, the water will be gone. [1] We also have reasons to think this self-sustaining climate is going to collapse soon [2]

So far the best way to protect it I have found is through the Rainforest Trust [3] which is a foundation that's trying to purchase and protect parts of the rainforests that companies would otherwise cut or burn down for agricultural use.

[1]https://youtu.be/hb3b-A6QAc8

[2]https://www.nasa.gov/earth-and-climate/human-activities-are-...

[3]https://www.rainforesttrust.org

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HappyPanacea ◴[] No.45399535[source]
How hard is it to plant it back?
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1. TSiege ◴[] No.45399613[source]
My understanding is very challenging for a few reasons. 1. A forest is not just a bunch of trees. It’s most healthy and robust with mature trees and right animal life that supports and propagates them 2. The short term economic incentives towards rehabilitating the forest aren’t there and are actively counter productive for soy and beef farming 3. It might already be past a tipping point as some parts of the forest are dying out and setting on fire through natural causes. The Amazon rainforest is NOT an ecosystem that is used to burning and it cannot recover from it since it destroys the ground cover and soils rainforest plants depend on to grow. Plants that like wet conditions need wet conditions to prosper, dusty charred clay ain’t that