--- title: The Amazon canopy: howlers, harpy eagles, toucans, dart frogs and sloth gardens — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «The Amazon canopy: howlers, harpy eagles, toucans, dart frogs and sloth gardens», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: High above the Amazon floor the tree tops join into a green roof called the canopy, full o --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / The Amazon canopy: howlers, harpy eagl… # The Amazon canopy: howlers, harpy eagles, toucans, dart frogs and sloth gardens Lesson 156 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 16 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/0/) — High above the Amazon floor the tree tops join into a green roof called the canopy, full of sunlight, fruit, flowers and animals that may never touch the ground. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/1/) — At dawn howler monkeys roar so loudly they can be heard kilometres away, toucans flick berries into their throats, and a harpy eagle with claws as long as a bear's watches for a sloth. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/2/) — A sloth is a slow little garden: green algae grow in its fur, moths live there too, and once a week it climbs all the way down to poo, the riskiest trip of its life. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/3/) — Cartoons show sloths as lazy jokers and toucans as cereal-box clowns; the real reasons are better: leaves give a sloth very little energy, and a toucan's huge beak is light, spongy inside and works like a radiator. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/4/) — Howler monkeys roar together to tell other troops where they are, and a hollow bone in the throat lets the sound carry several kilometres. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/5/) — Howlers rest most of the day, because their leafy food gives little energy. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/6/) — The harpy eagle is one of the most powerful eagles on Earth; it hunts sloths and monkeys with back claws as long as a bear's, flying fast between branches on short broad wings. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/7/) — A toucan picks fruit with the tip of its beak and flicks it back into its throat; the beak is a light honeycomb of bone covered in keratin, the stuff of our nails, and also lets out body heat. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/8/) — Some poison dart frogs carry each tadpole on their back up to a little pool of water in a bromeliad plant, where there are no fish to eat it. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/9/) — Poison dart frogs wear bright colours as a warning; wild frogs get their poison from the ants and mites they eat, so zoo frogs on other food are not poisonous. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/10/) — Three-toed sloths come down to the ground about once a week to poo, and algae and moths live in their fur. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/12/) — A spider monkey's tail grips a branch like a fifth hand, with ridged bare skin on the tip like a fingerprint. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/13/) — Only monkeys of the Americas have gripping tails; no monkey of Africa or Asia can hang by its tail. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/14/) — Epiphytes such as orchids, ferns and bromeliads live on branches high up, catching rain and fallen bits instead of rooting in the soil. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/15/) — When researchers sprayed a harmless mist into single canopy trees, beetles of hundreds of kinds fell out, many never named. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/156-the-amazon-canopy/16/) — Squirrel monkeys travel in big troops and often follow capuchin monkeys to find fruit trees, and many eyes spot eagles sooner. - ← previous: [The Amazon river: pink dolphins, flooded forest, giant fish and piranhas](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/155-the-amazon-river/) - next →: [The Amazon forest floor: leafcutters, army ants, tapirs, jaguars and the giant spider](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/157-the-amazon-forest-floor/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)