Amazon biome

The Amazon biome (Bioma Amazônia) contains the Amazon rainforest, an area of tropical rainforest, and other ecoregions that cover most of the Amazon basin and some adjacent areas to the north and east. The biome contains blackwater and whitewater flooded forest, lowland and montane terra firma forest, bamboo and palm forest, savanna, sandy heath and alpine tundra. Some areas of the biome are threatened by deforestation for timber and to make way for pasture or soybean plantations. The Amazon biome has an area of . The biome roughly corresponds to the Amazon basin, but excludes areas of the Andes to the west and cerrado (savannah) to the south, and includes lands to the northeast extending to the Atlantic ocean with similar vegetation to the Amazon basin. J. J. Morrone (2006) defines the Amazonian subregion in this broader sense, divided into the biogeographical provinces of Guyana, Humid Guyana, Napo, Imeri, Roraima, Amapá, Várzea, Ucayali, Madeira, Tapajós-Xingu, Pará, Yungas and Pantanal. The World Wildlife Fund takes a similar scope, where the Amazon biome includes the Guiana Shield rain forests in the north and the Chiquitano dry forests of Bolivia. The biome covers parts of Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana. In Brazil the biome covers more than and covers all or parts of the states of Acre, Amazonas, Roraima, Rondônia, Pará, Amapá, Maranhão, Tocantins and Mato Grosso. The Amazon biome covers 49.29% of Brazil. 16% of the biome is in Peru. As of 2015 about 23.4% of Peru's Amazon biome was protected, but of this less than half was fully protected. Much of the terrain of the Amazon biome, particularly around the rivers, is lowland plains. The Guiana Shield is an area of highlands along the border between Brazil and Venezuela and Guyana. The southern Amazonian highlands cross parts of Rondonia and Mato Grosso and the southern parts of Amazonas and Para. The Amazon basin is crossed by ridges or "paleoarches" that connect the Guiana and Central Brazil shields and divide it into geological sub-basins.