Atlas Obscura spoke to Guy Shrubsole about his conversation project aiming to map the rainforests of Britain:
Woodland conservationists consider the few fragments of ancient temperate rainforests that survive in Britain to be in more danger than their tropical counterparts, says Shrubsole, who describes himself as a “very amateur, but very enthusiastic naturalist.” “Knowing where the rainforests are is a crucial part of knowing how to save them,” he says. So Shrubsole, using crowdsourced information collected through his Lost Rainforests of Britain website, has begun plotting Britain’s first comprehensive rainforest map.
I had no idea Britain had rainforests but, after reading, these aren’t the same kind as you find in the Amazon. Due to the wet and mild conditions, Britain has temperate rainforests where plants called epiphytes can grow on other plants. It’s an interesting project and I wish Guy the best of luck.
The Woodland Trust has a great page on temperate rainforests, noting that they’re possibly more threatened than tropical rainforests like the Amazon. But I think we need to save them all regardless of priority. Damn humans and their pollution and expediting of climate change.