1. Amelia, Grace, Richard, Laurent

2. The Land * It stretches over Eurasia and North America. The taiga is located near the top of the world, just below the tundra biome. * Taiga is the biggest biome constituting almost thirty percent of the Earth’s entire forests * In Asia taiga covers a considerable portion of Russia, notably Siberia, but also northern Kazakhstan, the north part of Mongolia. within Japan.Japan * For Europe, taiga covers a band across most of Sweden, much of Finland and northern Norway.Sweden * Within North America, taiga constitutes the majority of interior Canada, along with the extreme northern elements of the USA including much of Alaska.

6. PEOPLE AND THE TAIGA: * The major industries of the taiga include logging, mining, and hydroelectric development. These activities have had negative impacts on areas of this biome and may continue to negatively affect it in the future. * A majority of the logging in the taiga is done by clear-cutting, using heavy machinery to remove much of the surrounding forest. * Hydroelectric development may seem beneficial because it uses water to generate power, but it has damaged the taiga by changing stream habitats and flow patterns, and flooding large areas and changing the landscape. * Mining is a concern because it may result in pollution of The Taiga is being destroyed everyday by humans. * Large-scale industrial forestry, or logging, is the greatest important threat affecting the boreal forest. The wood is used in the "pulp factory" for pulp and paper. * Other threats to the Taiga are oil and gas exploration, road building, mining, human triggered forest fire, and climate change. Animals of the Taiga are being hunted and trapped for their fur

7. * PLANTS: Compared to other biomes, the taiga has less diversity in plant life. The most common type of tree found in the taiga is the conifer, or cone-bearing tree. Conifers, also known as evergreens, include pines, spruces and firs. There may also occasionally be deciduous species present, such as oak, birch, willow, or alder, in a particularly wet or disturbed area. The soil in the taiga is thin, acidic and not very nutrient rich. It also is rocky. Due to these factors, plants in the taiga have different adaptations than the plants we find around Santa Barbara. * The< name, evergreen, describes an important adaptation of conifers. Just like Kermit, they are always green! Because they don't drop their leaves in the winter, they don't have to regrow them in the spring. This is good for trees in a tough environment because growing new leaves takes a lot of energy. Another adaptation of conifers to live in the with taiga has to do with their needles. Although the taiga has moderately high precipitation, the frozen winter ground makes it difficult for trees to get water. Having thin needles a waxy coating limits water loss of the conifer through transpiration. The dark color of the pine needles is also important. What happens when you where a dark T-shirt on a sunny day? You get hot, right? This is because your dark shirt is absorbing energy from the sun. Well, the dark needles do the same thing for the evergreen. They help the tree absorb the maximum amount of energy from the sun for photosynthesis. Conifers also have that pointy shape for a good reason. The winter snow slides right off of their branches. Without this shape the heavy snow might break or damage the conifer branches.

8. * A tall, coniferous, evergreen tree with a straight trunk, down-swept branches and open, pyramidal crown with a nodding tip; growing to a height of 30 - 50 m and a diameter of 1 m. * Needles: nearly flat, soft, glossy, widely spaced along twigs, of two lengths with the shorter ones standing upright along the top of the twigs producing a feathery, flat look yellowish-green on top and whitish on the underside. Bark: dark brown to reddish-brown, becoming thick and strongly grooved with age. Cones: numerous, small 1.5 - 2.5 cm long, greenish, turning brown with age hang from the ends of the branchlets.

9. * The balsam fir is one of the more important conifers of the Boreal Forest. It may also be referred to as balsam, Canadian balsam, eastern fir, and braced balsam firsmall to medium-sized evergreen conifer, averaging 15 to 23 m (50 to 75 ft) in height; topped with a dense crown. Branches whorled; branchlets principally opposite in flat sprays with smooth, waxy bark. Bark on trunk of young trees is smooth with resin blisters but becoming scaly with aging.

10. * Sometimes called evergreens, most coniferous trees keep their foliage year-round. There are over 600 living species of conifers, and while there is some debate over how many are native to Canada, the number is approximately 30. Conifers include the oldest and tallest trees. The oldest, the Bristlecone pine, can live to be nearly 5,000 years old. The tallest, the Coast redwood, grows to over 100 m high. Both of these conifers grow in California. Products made from coniferous trees include paper, many kinds of lumber, furniture and anti-cancer drugs. In large part because of their usefulness, conifers are in danger. Exploitation, forest degradation and habitat destruction have placed 34 per cent of conifers under threat of extinction.

11. * Douglas-firs are very big. They can grow from 40 to 60 feet tall and 15 to 25 feet wide. Because of this they are one of the most important lumber trees in the world. The wood is used as lumber, timbers, and plywood. The dense wood is very hard, stiff and durable. * Animals forage off the Douglas-fir in the winter or early spring when their other food supplies are covered in snow or haven't come up yet. Mule deer like it more than elk, but it is not an important food for both. Bears often scrape off the bark on young trees and eat the sap layer beneath. * The common name of the Douglas-fir is hyphenated because it isn't a true fir. It was named after David Douglas, the Scottish botanist.

12. * Paper birch trees have a thin bark that peels in horizontal layers which separates into sheets, almost like paper. Birch trees can grow in pairs or clusters. There are many different types of birch trees and they all grow fairly tall. Both the sweet and paper birch can grow anywhere from sixty to eighty feet high. Some smaller types of birches are yellow birch, which grows anywhere from fifty to seventy-five feet, the river birch which grows anywhere from fifty to sixty feet, and the smallest yet, the gray birch which very rarely grows higher than forty feet. Birch nutlets are fairly small and grow in a cone. Birches produce long catkins (scaly spikes) which hold tiny flowers. The closed male catkins appear in the autumn, whereas the female ones don't appear until the following spring.

13. * Bog blueberry (Vaccinium uliginosum), also commonly referred to as bog bilberry, is a deciduous shrub that grows to a height of only 8 to 16 inches. The white to pink flowers are produced in June and July followed by blue or black berries from late July through September. The foliage is oval-shaped and leathery. These plants often form dense mats or colonies in the boggy areas of the taiga. Bog blueberry fruit is used to make jams, jellies and pies. Birds, small mammals, caribou, moose and bears consume the leaves and berries.

14. * Mountain avens (Dryas) is a woody stemmed plant with a mat-forming growth habit that grows throughout the taiga forest in rocky and gravelly areas. It is an evergreen or semi-evergreen plant that grows only about 1 foot tall and produces 1- to 2-inch yellow, white or cream- colored flowers early in the spring. The blooms will commonly open facing the sun and turn to follow it across the sky. The entire-leaved mountain avens (Dryas integrifolia) is the floral emblem of the Northwest Territories. The foliage is dark green and resembles small oak leaves. This plant is not a major wildlife food source.

15. * in the taiga, the average temperature is below freezing for six months of the year. Although the cold winters have some snowfall, most of the precipitation comes during the warm, humid summer months. * The climate of the Taiga is very cold. Climate affects the composition of the soil making needles decompose slower, which makes rich soil develop more slowly. Temperatures can drop below - 60 degrees C (- 76 degrees F) in winter. The lowest temperature ever recorded was - 90 degrees F. Commonly weather rises above 104 degrees F (40 degrees C) in the summer. It can rise up 180 degrees F (82 degrees C). Due to such harsh weather there are few people and animals living in the Taiga. * Low high * Winter -65 F 30 F(-1C) * Summer 20 F(-7C) 70 F( 21C)

16. * Long, cold winters, and short, mild, wet summers are typical of this region. In the winter, chilly winds from the arctic cause bitterly cold weather in the taiga. The length of day also varies with the seasons. Winter days are short, while summer days are long because of the tilt of the earth on its axis. Fire is not uncommon in the taiga during the summer. Fires may seem destructive, but they actually help this biome by removing old sick trees, making room for new growth. Precipitation is relatively high in the taiga and falls as snow during the winter and rain during the summer. The total yearly precipitation in the taiga biome is 10 - 30 inches (25 - 75 cm).

17. * The sunlight has a great effect on the Taiga. In the summer the light is more direct. The Northern Hemisphere tilts toward the sun during the summer. In these warm months the Taiga can have sunlight for up to 24 hours per day. In winter the Taiga is tilted away from the sun. There are a few hours of sun in the middle of the day, but it is mostly dark.