Habitat loss, pesticides (农药) and climate change are threatening insect populations worldwide. In 2019, Biological Conservation reported that 40％ of all insects species are declining (减少) globally and that a third of them are endangered.
And while it may sound nice to live in a world with fewer bad insects, environmental writer Oliver Milman says that human beings would be in big trouble without insects. That’s because insects play important roles in pollinating (给……授粉) plants we eat, breaking down waste in forest soil and forming the base of a food chain that other larger animals-including humans-rely upon.
“It would be an extremely terrible place to live in-and certainly not something we should ever aim for,” Milman says of an insect-free existence. “You would certainly have mass starvation and social unrest...It’d be a place where there would be smelly waste and dead bodies everywhere because insects that break down those materials would be gone.”
Milman charts the troubling decline of insects in his new book, The Insect Crisis: The Fall of the Tiny Empires That Run the World. He says that while it’s impossible to know exactly what’s happening with every insect species in the world, the overall trends are not good: The butterfly population in North America has declined quickly in the past 40 years, for example, and a U.N. assessment done in 2019 found that half a million insect species are under threat of extinction, some in the coming decades.
“The world, our surroundings, would be far quieter, far duller without insects,” he, says. “When you start kind of digging down into these figures looking at the research, it’s clear that there’s something seriously wrong...There is a straight decline in most insect populations, and that spells major trouble for them but also for us.”
1. What should be the proper opinion about the insects according to the passage?| A．They can benefit the growth of plants. | B．They can prevent plants from harvesting. |
| C．They are harmful to humans. | D．They can produce a lot of waste. |
| A．The insects might make the world a terrible place to live in. |
| B．The insects might make much trouble to the dead bodies. |
| C．People would certainly have mass starvation with an insect-free existence. |
| D．The insects might produce too much smelly waste. |
| A．By comparing two insects. | B．By giving some examples. |
| C．By analyzing the data. | D．By using his research. |
| A．Positive. | B．Uninterested. | C．Supportive. | D．Worried. |
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【推荐1】My day is never complete without being outdoors and taking photos of wildlife, no matter the season. My husband, Mick and I took early retirement. Upon retirement, we moved from the Niagara region to the small town of Dwight, Ont. Our home was on a small private lake in the country. Luckily , there was lots of wildlife to keep it interesting.
One of our neighbours, George, introduced me to the wonderful world of bird watching. George had many feeders in his yard and I quickly learned the names of the many local birds that visited them often. My favourite was the ruby-throated hummingbird. These tiny , super fast little birds were both interesting and amazing to watch.
I remember one summer day going over to George’s house and standing on a ladder beside the feeder, trying to get a closeup of the tiny-winged bird, when it started to rain. I was sheltered as I stood on the second-to-top rung of the ladder so my camera and I didn’t get drenched. Then came the most amazing experience of my life. There must have been two dozen hummingbirds flying around me and the feeder for an hour or so, I enjoyed feeling the air across my face created by their hardworking wings and watching some of them come right up to within inches of my face looking at me. I was able to get a few good closeup shots but what was most memorable was the feeling of being part of the hummingbird community if only for that hour.
When the rain cleared, I remember walking back to my lake house still hearing the hum of two dozen little wings. That’s when I decided I needed to put up my own hummingbird feeder to study and learn from these little birds.
I bought a small feeder, filled it with sugar water and placed it in the tree outside my kitchen window. Within a short time I got my first little visitor. I’ll never forget how excited I was and how excited I am today, even after six years, every time I see one.
1. Which of the following best describes the author?| A．She has a generous spirit. | B．She is a specialist in wildlife. |
| C．She loves to connect with nature. | D．She finds it hard to get used to city life. |
| A．Suddenly lost. | B．Easily noticed. | C．Deeply attracted. | D．Completely wet. |
| A．Taking photos of hummingbirds. | B．Getting really close to hummingbirds. |
| C．Going bird watching with her husband. | D．Setting up feeders with the help of George. |
| A．Her quiet life came to an end. | B．A group of birds flew around her. |
| C．A hummingbird soon paid a visit. | D．Sugar water in it was left untouched. |
【推荐2】To make room for agriculture, trees and other plants are often cleared away so that farmers have space to grow crops. The clearing of forests forces many animals from their homes. They often flee the area in search of a new place to live. There is a big downside to that. Some of those animals are natural predators. They control pest populations. They can help to clear the fields of rats, mice, and other rodents that eat and damage crops.
This happened at one small farming village in Indonesia. After land was cleared for farming, rats and mice began appearing in large numbers. Villagers tried to target the animals by smoking them out and hunting them. But the villagers were unsuccessful.
So, one farmer decided to try another method- a natural one.
Pujo Arto brought owls to his farm. Owls, after all, are experts at hunting rodents. It is what they do. And it worked! However, Pujo Arto didn't stop with his own field. He set up a Natural Predator Program. Now, owls are busy catching rats and mice in the fields around the village of Tlogoweru. There is a huge upside: no need for chemical pesticides which can harm not only rodents, but other creatures.
In 2011, the Indonesian man began setting up boxes where the owls live. He is also raising owlets in the village. After about four months, the young birds are released. These facilities have raised more than owls. They have also raised awareness in the community about the importance of owls. They raised awareness within their community by building homes for those owls. At the same time, government officials helped to create laws to protect those owls.
In addition to controlling pests naturally, there is another upside to the program. His village is now a popular stop for eco-tourists. People interested in learning more about owls, wildlife protection and natural pest control come to his village to learn more.
1. Why did the owls get away from the land around the village?| A．There was no food to eat. |
| B．There were too many rats and mice. |
| C．They were smoked away. |
| D．They had no place to live. |
| A．to use owls to catch the crop-damaging rodents |
| B．to attract eco-tourists to the village |
| C．to raise awareness of protecting forests |
| D．to control pests by using chemical pesticides |
a. introducing owls
b. pests being controlled naturally
c. rodents appearing in large numbers.
d. clearing forests
| A．abcd |
| B．bcda |
| C．dcab |
| D．dabc |
| A．The importance of protecting owls. |
| B．Indonesian village uses owls to protect crops. |
| C．The advantages of using natural predators in agriculture. |
| D．The government's role in using owls to control pests. |
【推荐3】Over the past 25 years, dozens of cats have appeared in my yard, silently begging for food. Most cats come and go, but Minnie stayed for 11 years.
When I first spotted her, Minnie was young and weak. She would creep up to eat the leftovers after I fed my cats. Pretty soon, she was regularly appearing at dinnertime. I would provide cat’s food just for her, but she would hide behind until I went back inside. Then, with no human near, she would wolf down her meals.
Minnie stuck around our house, and she was scrawny no more. Actually, she kept gaining weight —especially around her middle. Yes, she was pregnant. We prepared a small shelter in the garage, where Minnie would give birth and care for her kittens.
Once the kittens had been adopted, I began to spend hours in the yard, sitting as still as possible with a bowl of cat food next to me. She would sit a few feet from me, examining my every move. I, in turn, ignored her, reading my book, silently begging for her to come closer. She never did. I finally accepted that she was never going to let me pet her, but she still became my constant companion. Whenever I’d go outside, she’d meow hello then follow me around the house. This went on for three years.
Then one morning, Minnie just wasn’t there. I searched and searched around the neighborhood, but no Minnie. It always hurts to lose an animal you love. But I wouldn’t give anything in the world for the time we had with our Minnie. Untouchable as she was, she taught me friendship and love can be shared just by being present and accepting. No physical or verbal interaction needed. Just be there.
1. What can we learn about Minnie from paragraph 2?| A．She was eager for human affection. | B．She was afraid of human presence. |
| C．She was attracted by the author’s cat. | D．She preferred leftovers to cat’s food. |
| A．Frightened. | B．Cautious. | C．Lonely. | D．Thin. |
| A．To befriend Minnie. | B．To enjoy reading. |
| C．To chock on Minnie’s safety. | D．To look after Minnie’s kittens. |
| A．Mentally irreplaceable. | B．Emotionally distant. |
| C．Physically beneficial. | D．Behaviorally unpredictable. |
【推荐1】Honeybees can’t swim, and when their wings are wet, they can’t fly, either. But Chris Roh and other researchers at the California Institute of Technology found that when bees drop into bodies of water, they can use their wings to produce little waves and slide toward land—like surfers who create and then ride their own waves.
As with many scientific advances－Isaac Newton’s apple or Benjamin Franklin’s lightning bolt—Dr. Roh’s experiment began with a walk. Passing Caltech’s Millikan Pond in 2016, he observed a bee on the water’s surface producing waves. He wondered how an insect known for flight could push itself through water.
Dr. Roh and his co-worker, Morteza Gharib, used butterfly nets to collect local Pasadena honeybees and observed their surf-like movements. The researchers used a wire to restrict each bee’s bodily movement, allowing close examination of their wings. They found that the bee bends its wings at a 30-degree angle, pulling up water and producing a forward force. Bees get trapped on the surface because water is roughly three times heavier than air. But that weight helps to push the bee forward when its wings move quickly up and down. It’s a tough exercise for the bees, which the researchers guess could handle about 10 minutes of the activity.
The researchers said the surf-like movement hasn’t been documented in other insects and most semiaquatic insects use their legs for pushing power, which is known as water-walking. It may have developed in bees, they predicted.
Dr. Roh and Dr. Gharib have imagined many practical applications for bees’ surfing. One plan is to use their observations to design robots able to travel across sky and sea. “This could be useful for search and rescues, or for getting samples of the surface of the ocean, if you can’t send a boat or helicopter,” Dr. Gharib said.
1. What does the author intend to show by mentioning Newton and Franklin?| A．Roh’s admiration for them. | B．Roh’s chance discovery about bees. |
| C．Their outstanding talent for science. | D．Their similar achievements in discovery. |
| A．The air weight. | B．Its leg extension. |
| C．The water movement. | D．Its continuous wing beat. |
| A．Uncaring. | B．Supportive. | C．Doubtful. | D．Worried. |
| A．Honeybees can surf to safety. | B．Bees help scientists make inventions. |
| C．Insects can adapt to the environment. | D．Nature is a helpful guide for discovery. |
【推荐2】Although onions taste delicious, watering eyes come with the process when you cut them up. Thankfully, Good Housekeeping has suggested some tips for preventing yourself from crying while trying to cut up an onion.
According to the findings from an institute, putting onions in a fridge for 30 minutes before cutting it can prevent the annoying hurt, as the cold stops the tear-jerking (催泪的) gas from being produced.
Another way to reduce the gas released by the onion is to put it in water for a while. Good Housekeeping recommends:“Cut the end off the onion and then put it straight into a bowl of water. The water will draw the acid, making you shed less tears when you cut it.”
When an onion grows, it mixes with sulfur (硫) in the soil to create a special mineral acid. When the onion is cut into pieces, it reacts and creates a gas. As it reaches your face, this annoying gas causes the eyes to produce tears.
The root is where the gases are most concentrated, so it is recommended that this part of the onion be left on as you cut it to avoid uncomfortable eyes. Do this by cutting the vegetable in half down the middle to create a flat surface. Then, place the onion with its flat surface down and cut it towards the root.
Also, to reduce the gas’s effect on your eyes, cut it next to a window or near a fan so the gas is blown away from your face. And take care to use a sharp knife; this will make it easier to move through the vegetable, causing fewer cells to be broken and fewer gases to be released as a result.
1. Refrigerating the onion before cutting it can .| A．change its taste |
| B．make it easier to cut up |
| C．avoid the appearing of the gas |
| D．help the gases mix more quickly |
| A．Some mineral acid is lost. |
| B．The tear mixture is created. |
| C．The sulfur inside it pours out. |
| D．A chemical reaction produces a gas. |
| A．A health column. |
| B．A science journal. |
| C．A fashion magazine. |
| D．A food guidebook. |
| A．To offer an explanation and advice. |
| B．To conduct an investigation and analysis(分析). |
| C．To have a discussion and draw a conclusion. |
| D．To give a presentation and make a comparison. |
【推荐3】There goes the proverb, “The early bird catches the worm.” It has been proven that early bird really does catch the worm, but he saves it for dinner. The Oxford University researchers believe the strategy allows them to stock up on food while it helps avoid falling the victims to predators (捕食者).
A full belly in the morning would slow them down in the hunt for food and make them easy prey. So they search out food when they are lean and light and then dine in the evening to ensure they have a big enough store of fat to survive the night.
The “early bird” strategy was revealed in an experiment in which over 2,000 birds were fitted with tiny radio tags which activated when they landed on feeders hidden in Wytham Woods, near Oxford. The feeders were moved around over the course of the day and the researchers noted when the birds landed on them.
“Our results show these birds display very different patterns of food discovery in the morning and afternoon; very few new food sources were found during the afternoon, whereas nearly every new food source we put out during the morning was quickly discovered.” This revealed that the birds were much better at finding the feeders new locations in the morning. However, they waited until the evening to feast on the worms.
The researchers said the complex strategy acts as an insurance policy, with birds remaining light yet still able to get enough fat to survive the night. It is particularly important in winter when the risks of predation are high and just one day without food can make the difference between life and death for small birds.
1. What does the underlined phrase “stock up on” in Paragraph 1 mean?| A．store up. | B．dispose of. | C．throw away. | D．eat and digest. |
| A．By comparing the data collected. |
| B．By referring to the previous research papers. |
| C．By conducting a random survey in the woods. |
| D．By observing the birds’ habits of catching worms. |
| A．Birds have a better appetite in the morning. |
| B．Birds prefer to hunt for food in the morning. |
| C．Birds won’t hunt for food unless they are hungry. |
| D．Birds hunt as frequently in the morning as in the afternoon. |
| A．Because it can help them cope with food shortage. |
| B．Because they do this for security reasons in a sense. |
| C．Because they can’t eat up all the food they have caught. |
| D．Because there are more worms available in the morning. |
【推荐1】If scientists could create a pill that let you live twice as long while remaining free of diseases, would you take it?
If one considers only the personal benefits that longer life would bring, the answer might seem like a no-brainer: people could spend more time with loved ones; watch future generations grow up; learn new languages or try different careers.
But what about society as a whole? Would it be better off if the human lifespan were doubled? The question is of growing importance, and serious debate about it goes back a few years to the Kronos Conference on Longevity Health Sciences in Arizona. Gregory Stock, director of the Programme on Medicine, Technology, and Society at UCLA’s School of Public Health, answered the question with a firm “yes”. A doubled lifespan, Stock said, would “give us a chance to recover from our mistakes, lead us towards longer-term thinking and delay the start of expensive diseases of aging. It would also raise productivity through adding to our prime years”.
Callahan, a co-founder of the Hastings Centre in New York, didn’t share Stock’s enthusiasm. For one thing, he said, doubling lifespans won’t solve any of our current social problems. “We have war, poverty, all sorts of issues around, and I don’t think any of them would be at all helped if people lived longer,” Callahan said in a telephone interview. “The question is, ‘What will we get as a society?’ I suspect it won’t be a better society.”
Others point out that a doubling of the human lifespan will affect society at every level. Ideas about marriage and work will change in fundamental ways, they say, as will attitudes towards the young and the old.
1. In paragraph 2, the underlined phrase “a no-brainer” most probably refers to ________.| A．something coming to mind naturally |
| B．someone unwilling to think |
| C．something difficult to bear in mind |
| D．someone having a low IQ |
| A．thinking less frequently |
| B．having fewer diseases of aging |
| C．making more mistakes |
| D．working productively longer |
| A．Aging: Burden or Treasure |
| B．Base of Society: the Old or the Young |
| C．Longer Lives: For or Against |
| D．A Doubled Lifespan: Possible or Not |
【推荐2】Far, far below your feet lies a source of nearly endless energy. Earth's core is about as hot as the surface of the Sun, so hot that it melts the rocky layers above it into magma, or liquid rock. Wouldn't it be great if we could tap into all that energy? In some places, we do!
The Geysers is an area north of San Francisco in California where magma's heat turns a reservoir of underground water into steam. This region is home to 18 geothermal power plants. The steam rises up through spaces between the rocks underground, a bit like how steam pours from a teakettle boiling on a stove. The power plant has pipelines that send the steam into the turbines (涡轮机) where electricity flow is generated. Once the steam leaves the turbine, it goes into a cooling tower where it turns back into liquid. Then it's piped back into the reservoir to be reheated again. Other kinds of geothermal power plants pump hot groundwater into the power plant. Then the pressure is reduced, causing the liquid to flash into steam that turns the turbine and generates electricity flow. Once the steam cools and turns back into liquid, it's pumped back down into the reservoir to begin the cycle again.
So why don't we all heat our homes with free steam from the earth? First, the heat has to be close enough to the surface for us to reach it. Next, there has to be plenty of underground water to be heated. Finally, there has to be a layer of rock that water or steam can flow through. So in places where all three of those things come together, geothermal energy can be a powerful renewable energy source. Besides, when a geothermal plant returns water back into the hot rocks of a reservoir, it makes the rock crack a bit, which can cause small earthquakes. There's another danger that comes with drilling near magma-pipes and other equipment might melt if they hit a pocket of magma or are caught in an eruption. One geothermal plant in Hawaii was partially buried by lava in 2018. But engineers are hopeful that the repaired plant will generate even more power. Geothermal energy isn't the answer for everywhere, but it's a piece of the puzzle to help slow climate change.
1. In which part of power plants is the electricity made?| A．The turbine. | B．The reservoir. | C．The pipeline. | D．The tower. |
| A．Hard surface and possible earthquakes. |
| B．Changeable climate and unqualified equipment. |
| C．Limited underground water and thin layers of rock. |
| D．Unsuitable geological conditions and potential dangers. |
| A．To demonstrate the great effort that engineers made. |
| B．To show the power that the repaired plant can generate. |
| C．To illustrate the danger caused by drilling near magma. |
| D．To praise the engineers who repaired the generate plant. |
| A．Unconcerned. | B．Unclear. | C．Doubtful. | D．Approving. |
【推荐3】As years went by, I realized that one of the biggest problems of these adults was worry. A large majority of students were businessmen, executives, salesmen, engineers, accountants：a cross section of all the trades and professions—and most of them had problems! There were women in the classes—businesswomen and housewives. They, too, had problems! Clearly, what I needed was a textbook on how to conquer worry—so again I tried to find one.
I went to New York’s great public library at Fifth Avenue and Fortysecond Street and discovered, to my astonishment, that this library had only twenty-two books listed under the title WORRY. I also noticed, to my amusement, that it had one hundred and eighty-nine books listed under WORMS. Almost nine times as many books about worms as about worry! Surprising, isn’t it? Since worry is one of the biggest problems facing mankind, you would think, wouldn’t you, that every high school and college would give a course on “How to Stop Worrying”?
Yet, is there even one course on that subject in any college in the land? I have never heard of it. No wonder David Seabury said in his book How to Worry Successfully：“We grow up with as little preparation for the pressures of experience as a bookworm asked to do a ballet (芭蕾舞).”
The result? More than half of our hospital beds are occupied by people with nervous and emotional troubles.
I looked over those twenty-two books on worry, reposing(靠) on the shelves of the New York Public Library. In addition, I purchased all the books on worry I could find；yet I couldn’t discover even one that I could use as a textbook in my course for adults. So I decided to write one by myself.
1. What made the writer realize one of the adults’ biggest problems?| A．His wide reading. |
| B．His practical survey. |
| C．His scientific research. |
| D．His students’ real situation. |
| A．Worry is extremely common. |
| B．We lack knowledge of worry. |
| C．We show no interest in worry. |
| D．Worry can hardly be controlled. |
| A．show us how to conquer worry |
| B．warn us of the possible danger of worry |
| C．persuade us to get rid of worry |
| D．explain why he wanted to write a book on worry |
