Tree cover and shade provide
a healthy stream where fish can live.
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When the forest
is removed, the river's ecology is changed -- and the fish disappear.
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The major factor contributing to the demise of fresh-water fishes in Madagascar is the degradation of aquatic habitats as a result of regional deforestation.
It is estimated that two-thirds of Madagascar's original
rain-forest cover had been lost by 1985. The main cause of this high rate of deforestation is traditional agriculture, involving periodic clearing of forest on a shifting basis. At current deforestation rates, little of Madagascar's rain forest cover will survive into the next century.
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