Producers: Where it All StartsBy: Nick De Haas
In the rainforest producers play a very important role. They are the bottom of the food chain and they provide food to the herbivores.  If the producers did not exist nothing else would. plants produce oxygen by converting it from carbon dioxide which is the reason that they are called producers. the producers of the Amazon provide 20% of the oxygen for the earth. The producers, which have chlorophil in their leaves, use the sun's light energy to make glucose throught the process of photosynthesis.

Courtesy of PBS  
Name of Plant: Brazil Nut Tree
 
Description of Plant: The brazil nut tree can grow up to 150 feet.  It is an evergreen and it produces round woody fruits. It lives in the canopy of the Amazon rainforest. It is found in the canopy of the Amazon rainforest.
 
Uses of Plant (consumption/medicinal): the fruits are made into oils and the oils are used to make soap and for cooking.
 
Name of Plant: Strangler Fig Tree
 
Description of Plant: It is a vine that climbs up the tree and "strangles" it.  It does this when a animal poops out a seed onto the host tree and it germinates and sends a vine down to the forest floor and it keeps doing this until the host tree dies. It lives on othe herbivores of the Amazon rainforest.
 
Uses of Plant (consumption/medicinal): Monkeys, macaws, and bats eat it.
 

Courtesy of PBS

Courtesy of PBS
Name of Plant: Cacao tree 
 
Description of Plant: The cacao tree can grow to be up to 25 feet high and it produces fruit that can be made into chocolate. It is found in the canopy of the Amazon rainforest.
 
Uses of Plant (consumption/medicinal): The cacao fruit  is used to make chocolate and other various products.
 
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