So I learned that million years ago The Philippines islands hadn’t rose up the sea level. So I’m curious how over time the country gained an abundant amount of land animals.
In: Earth Science
1. **Land bridges**: during the ice ages, sea levels were lower because so much of the Earth’s water was frozen as ice, and so many places that are islands now were actually connected to continents as peninsulas. When the ice melted, sea levels rose, and turned the peninsulas into islands.
2. **Rafting**: storms tear apart trees and create natural rafts of tangled branches and vines that float down rivers and out to sea. Animals trapped on these rafts get carried by the ocean currents to islands.
3. **Swimming**: Some animals can swim really well.
4. **Humans**: Humans with boats carried pigs (deliberately) and rats (accidentally) with them to islands they settled.
Many different ways
Human intervention led to livestock being brought on boats and accidentally let loose. Cows, pigs, chicken, etc.
Ocean currents pick up velocity during storms, many times animals get swept up in the storm current and wash up in new environments. With enough similar species, they will go into make a sustaining population.
Continental drift divides ecosystems over millions of years. Animals trapped by a dividing landmass inherit traits that break them off as a subspecies or a new species entirely.
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