Project Amazonas

Each minute the Amazon River discharges 3.4 million gallons of water into the Atlantic, 14 times the discharge of the Mississippi.

Before European contact in 1542, it is estimated that as many as 10 million people lived in the Amazon. Today there are less than 200,000 indigenous people. Almost one hundred distinct tribes have disappeared since the early 1900’s due to introduced diseases, persecution, and assimiliation.

During the rainy season the Amazon River overflows its banks and can extend into the forest for a width of 25 miles in some places. Where it empties into the Atlantic Ocean, the Amazon is over 200 miles wide!

A typical four square mile patch of rainforest may contain as many as 1,500 flowering plant species, 750 species of trees, 400 species of birds and 150 species of butterflies.

Although rainforests cover less than 2% of the Earth's surface area, they are home to 50% of the Earth's plant and animal species.