Earth Day- April 22nd

 If you log onto Google today, you will see a special animation celebrating our home: the Earth. 

This year´s Google video talks about bees! They are some of the most important pollinators. Click through to watch the video and play the game where you pollinate flowers. 

On Earth day, we remember to appreciate the environment, but we should take care of our planet every day. 

Climate change is the biggest factor that is impacting the Earth. This is when the air gets polluted due to greenhouse gases.

What happens inside of a greenhouse?

Greenhouses heat up, so pollution like excessive carbon dioxide are trapped in the Earth's atmosphere and keep heat in. This affects the weather, not only by heating up the Earth, but by also making it extremely cold too. 

This has an impact on animals' habitats and on humans too. 

Read about some animals that are affected here. 

What are some things we can do to protect our planet? 

What happens after a forest fire?

 In evergreen or "coniferous" forests, which are forests full of gymnosperms, some trees have adapted to only "mature" or let their seeds out when exposed to heat. 

This means that during a fire, it will release its seeds from a cone.

These are called "serotinous cones". Read more about them below:

"In environments where hot, fast moving fires are frequent, some pine species have developed very thick, hard cones that are literally glued shut with a strong resin. These “serotinous” cones can hang on a pine tree for years, long after the enclosed seeds mature. Only when a fire sweeps through, melting the resin, do these heat-dependent cones open up, releasing seeds that are then distributed by wind and gravity."
(National Forest Foundation)

Watch this video to see how the cones open up with heat to release their seeds.