ambience: cloud forest, chapter 2.
At around 2000m elevation in Ecuador, lowland tropical rainforest gives way to cloud forest, so named because of fairly constant cloud cover due to condensation of warm air from the lowlands. Cloud forest is characterized by high diversity of trees, ferns, and epiphytes (plants that grow on top of other plants, like orchids and bromeliads). This ecosystem also has many endemic species—that is, species that are found only in that particular environment. Cloud forests are valuable because of their high levels of biodiversity, and because they function as watersheds.
Most photos and audio recorded at the Yanayacu Biological Station near Cosanga, in the Napo Province. Some (between the yellow insect and the motmots, the orange birds) were taken in Mindo, Pichincha Province. The sounds are: rain, cicadas, bird, bee buzzing in hole in wood, more birds, more cicadas, and more rain.
work cited: J. Kricher, A Neotropical Companion (Princeton University Press, Princeton, ed. 2, 1997)
