I dedicate this book to my future teacup pig that I will be getting for my birthday.

Preview audio:

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Once upon a time in the rain forest, there lived Polly.Polly was very adventurous and loved to travel to new places. She especially loved to travel to places with tons of different animals to make more friends. Out of all the places she has been, the rainforest in Australia is by far her favorite.

Since Polly lives near the equator, it is warm and moist year round. Polly has many friends in this biome, considering all the different types of plants and animals. Polly is never thirsty because the rain forest gets about 60-160 inches per year!! Some of Polly's friends are things like monkeys and toucans. Polly's favorite food is passion fruit and Polly enjoys sleeping on the moss.

Polly's friend Tiff the Toucan has a really long beak. He has this long beak so that he can reach fruit on other branches that are too small to support his weight. In the rainforest, there is also fungus so watch out. It could be hiding anywhere on the rainforest floor. It especially likes deep, dark places where there is little sunlight. Since most plants on the rainforest floor don't get much sunlight, the fungi have learned to adapt to this. The bamboo here can grow 9 inches each day and over %25 of natural medicines have been found in the rainforest!

Sometimes Polly gets tired of being in the rainforest all the time, so she is thinking about going somewhere she has neer been. What about the tundra!

Finally, I have arrived! It was so windy that I kept getting blown backwards! It is so different here than my home back in Australia. It is almsot summer and its snowing! It is 10 degrees outside and I did not bring clothes for this weather. I was talking to some polar bears named Izzy and Grizzly and they said that they only get about 6-10 inches of rain per year! For the first time today, I tried bearberries and there were delicious. I might take some home with me to share with my friends.

I barely got any sleep last night! The sun was shining all day and night! Even though I am so tired, I will still go visit my new friends, Izzy and Grizzly. Izzy was telling me that the reason why she has such tiny ears was to keep the water from getting into their ears or eardrums. Grizzly told me that his favorite food is the Arctic Willow but it is sometimes hard to find because it grows close to the ground to stay out of the way of strong wind. Izzy told me that she likes to call the tundra a carbon sink because it stores more carbon dioxide than it gives off.

Did you know that the word tundra comes from the Finnish word meaning treeless land?

Polly thinks that is a little too cold in the tundra to stay very long, so she is going to go to the Sahara Desert!

I've arrived!! It is so hot that I think I am going to melt! When I was flying in I met a camel named Habibi. He took me on a tour all around the desert and told me that it is very hot year round, but he isn't affected by it. Deserts re also by the equator. After all of that touring around the desert I am so thirsty, but there is no water to be found. Habibi explained that they only get about 25 centimeters per year. Also Habibi introduced me to his friend named Skitzza, which is a lizard. There was also this really cool plant called a cactus, but I was warned not to touch it or it would prick me!

I am so tired, but I had such a good time! As I was heading back to where I was staying for bed, Skitzza was going out to hunt for food. I told her it was late, but she said the reason why she goes out so late is so that she can avoid the extremely hot temperatures. I could not go to sleep because I was wondering how plants survive in the desert without water, so I took a quick trip to see Habibi. He said that plants, such as cacti, have big roots so that they can absorb water right when it hits the ground.

I bet you didn't know that rain usually evaporates before it even hits the ground which is why it is so dry!

The Sahara desert spans 12 different countries!

The desert is a little to hot for my preference, so now I will go to the grasslands where it is not too hot. Off I go!!

I am now in the grasslands! When I first arrived in the grasslands I met a deer named Darby. He was so friendly and told me all about the grasslands. He told me that the grasslands have some of the richest soil in the world and that they are mainly covered with grass! They also can be called prairies and are used for farming. Darby also mentioned that there are usually hot summers and cold winters and that there is usually snow during the winter. I found all of this very interesting and very different from the other biomes where I have traveled.