In a world-record effort to help save a valuable sea creature, Australian scientists have released hundreds of baby seahorses into the wild. The tiny seahorses are endangered, and the scientists hope the new seahorses will help their numbers grow.
Seahorses get their name because they look a bit like horses. They aren’t great swimmers, even though they’re fish. They often use their tails to hold onto something in the water. They mostly live in warm, shallow waters around the world. They are often found in coral reefs, in beds of seagrass, and areas where rivers empty into the sea. Seahorses form an important part of the ocean’s food chain. They eat tiny sea creatures and are eaten by bigger sea animals.
Many kinds of seahorses are often threatened by the human actions. Sometimes they’re caught and sold as pets. They are also caught by accident when people are trying to catch other fish.
To begin the project, scientists collected three pregnant seahorses in January. Those seahorses were brought back to the aquarium (水族馆) in Sydney. After the babies were born, the scientists kept them there for five months, feeding the baby seahorses shrimps (小虾) to help them grow strong. Scientist Mitchell Brennan says, “They don’t have a stomach, so they have to eat constantly.”
About a month before the young seahorses were released, the scientists created eight underwater “hotels” for them. The hotels look like cages, providing a safe place for the seahorses to develop. Putting the hotels into the sea early allowed the cages to be covered with small sea life that can help provide food for the seahorses.
This is the fifth time the scientists have released seahorses into the area, and this time was a record. Around 380 seahorses were released. The researchers put tiny tags (标记) under the skin of many of the seahorses to help track them in the future.
1. What does the underlined word “released” mean in Paragraph 1?| A．Published. | B．Apologised. | C．Destroyed. | D．Freed. |
| A．Dangers the seahorses face. | B．Living conditions the seahorses need. |
| C．Areas the seahorses live in. | D．The types of the seahorses. |
| A．To differ the project from the former ones. | B．To avoid danger the scientists may face |
| C．To provide food for the seahorses. | D．To help track the seahorses in the future. |
| A．A New Study on Endangered Animals |
| B．A Record Number of Baby Seahorses Were Released |
| C．Underwater “Hotels” for Baby Shrimps |
| D．New Methods of Finding Endangered Seahorses |
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【推荐1】We see a woman swimming at night in a dark sea. Suddenly, she is pulled underwater. She surfaces, cries in fear, then disappears forever. This is the opening scene from the 1975film Jaws, showing a shark attack. It was a great success, attracting huge audiences and winning many awards. It also strengthened people’s long-held idea of the great white shark.
People have always been scared of sharks, but Jaws made things worse. Many people who saw the film started to believe that sharks were dangerous animals that ate humans. Some started fishing for sharks, killing as many as they could. At that time, nobody cared if sharks were killed, or how many were killed.
After 1975, the number of large sharks fell quickly. This was not only due to fear of sharks, but also finning. Finning is a type of fishing where sharks are caught and their fins(鳍) cut off to be used in shark fin soup. Finning kills millions of sharks a year.
Finning would have an unexpected effect upon Peter Benchley, the man who wrote the book the film Jaws was based on. In 1980, Benchley came across an awful sight in an area where fishermen were finning, leaving the sea floor covered with dead sharks. Benchley saw sharks being killed and this caused a deep change in him. He came to see people as a danger to sharks, rather than the other way round. From that day on, he fought to protect sharks. He admitted that his book was wrong about sharks’ behavior. “Sharks don’t target humans,” he said.
Fortunately, not everyone who watched the film Jaws became afraid of sharks — some became interested in understanding them. Today, as we learn more about sharks, more people than ever want to protect them from extinction.
1. The passage begins with a scene of the film Jaws to ________.| A．introduce the topic of sharks | B．show the success of the film |
| C．describe how evil the shark is | D．attract people to watch the film |
| A．Sharks were believed to be endangered animals. |
| B．Sharks wouldn’t have been killed without the film Jaws. |
| C．People had no idea how scary sharks were if not for the film. |
| D．Misunderstanding towards sharks was deepened due to the film. |
| A．He became more interested in shark movies. |
| B．He no longer saw sharks as a threat to humans. |
| C．He decided to protect sharks by rewriting his book. |
| D．He admitted being responsible for the deaths of sharks. |
| A．Hopeful. | B．Unsure. | C．Mixed. | D．Unconcerned. |
【推荐2】Mutual cooperation in which humans cooperate with wild animals is extremely rare. One such system involves the greater honeyguide, a small African bird that leads humans to sources of honey. Once a nest is found, the human honey hunters break into it to obtain honey and bee worms, and the birds benefit from consuming beeswax in the now-exposed honey comb. Both the birds and the humans use specialized sounds to communicate their availability to participate in this cooperative interaction.
The two areas studied by Spottiswoode and Wood are northern Mozambique, where the honey hunters are from the Yao cultural group, and northern Tanzania, where the honey hunters are from the Hadza culture. The Yao communicate with honeyguides using a short and high-pitched sound followed by a low sound “brrrrhm”, whereas the Hadza use a melodic whistle. Thus, signal and response both vary geographically.
Spotiswoode and Wood propose that the geographic variation they have identified in this mutualism is the product of cultural codevelopment. To qualify as cultural, the cooperative behaviors would have to be acquired through social learning from individuals of the same species. Social learning, however, is less of a given on the honeyguide side. Instead, what is required of honeyguides is another form of vocal learning—comprehension learning—in which the meaning of a signal is learned. Comprehension learning is common in birds. Whether social learning is involved, however, is not so obvious.
Honeyguides put in considerable effort helping their human partners find food and are faithfully rewarded by being given food in return. In some human cultures, honey hunters purposefully leave out honeycomb to reward honeyeaters, but in others the hunters go, to great length to deny the birds any reward, by collecting, burying, or burning any honeycomb exposed when they destroy a nest. The reason given for these act s is that keeping the birds hungry causes them to continue guiding.
A promising question for future research is whether geographic differences in human cultural preferences for rewarding or not rewarding honeyguides affect the preferences of individual birds for guiding versus taking advantage of the guiding of others.
1. What is the purpose of mentioning the two areas in Paragraph 2?| A．To prove that honey hunting is very popular in their culture. |
| B．To explain that birds can understand various human cultures. |
| C．To illustrate the differences between the Yao and the Hadza. |
| D．To show that communication methods differ in geography. |
| A．To let them realize human’s power. | B．To make them keep providing help. |
| C．To cause them to burn honeycomb. | D．To use the honeycomb themselves. |
| A．Honeyguides have already had strong skills of social learning. |
| B．Honeyguides have a genetic tendency to guide humans for honey. |
| C．Humans and honeyguides have a mutually beneficial relationship. |
| D．Human honey hunters will lose their jobs without honeyguides. |
| A．The impact of human cultural preferences on honeyguide behavior. |
| B．The further study on the cultural differences in human preferences. |
| C．The ecologically rewarding consequences of honeyguide behavior. |
| D．The influence of honeyguide behavior on human cultural practices. |
【推荐3】Elephants are able to know the difference between a man and a woman, and can tell an adult (成年人) from a child—all from the sound of a human voice. This is according to a study in which researchers played voice recordings to wild African elephants.
The animals showed more fear when they heard the voices of adult Masai men. Usually Masai people hunt elephants, and this suggests that animals have grown to listen for and avoid them.
Prof. Karen McComb and Dr Graeme Shannon from the University of Sussex led the study. They explained that in former research they had used similar experiments to show that elephants could tell—from the sound of a lion—whether the animal was a female (雌性) or a more dangerous male (雄性).
Prof. McComb wanted to find out if the animals used their very sharp sense of hearing to recognize danger from humans.
The scientists recorded Masai men, women and children saying, in their own language, “Look, look over there, a group of elephants are coming.” They also recorded Kamba men saying this phrase.
Masai people often come across elephants, which can result in violent (暴力的) hunting. Kamba people, however, mainly feed on agriculture, which does not generally bring them into violent touch with the animals.
When the team played recordings of these different voices through a hidden speaker, they found that elephant family groups showed more fear in response to the voice of a Masai man, than to a Kamba man’s voice. And the adult male Masai voices caused far more violent response than the voices of women or boys.
1. An elephant can tell a man from a woman by sense of ________.| A．touch | B．sight | C．smell | D．hearing |
| A．By watching the elephants in the zoo. | B．By playing voice recordings to them. |
| C．By recording the behaviors of elephants. | D．By communicating with them in a special way. |
| A．Masai men | B．Masai women | C．Kamba men | D．Kamba women |
| A．Elephants and Human Beings | B．Differences Between Human Voices |
| C．Elephants Recognize Human Voices | D．Elephants at War with Human Beings |
【推荐1】In the early 1970s American women gave birth, on average, to 2.12 children each. By 2018 that number had fallen to 1.73. Jordan Nickerson and David Solomon, professors at MIT, think they have found an interesting factor which help explain this change: America’s increasingly protective child car-seat laws.
Their study examines the effect that car-seat policies may have had on American birth rates. During the 1980s, only the children aged under three had to be secured in child-safety seats. But since then, the requirements have been slowly increased. Today, most places in America make children sit in safety seats until their eighth birthdays. That concern for youngsters’ safety has had the unexpected consequence of fewer three-child families.
In drawing this conclusion they have connected population data with changes in state laws on safety seats. They discovered that stricter laws had no noticeable effects on the rates of births of first and second children, but with a drop, on average, of 0.73 percentage points in the number of women giving birth to a third while the first two were young enough to need safety seats.
The professors also made two other related observations. The reduction they saw was limited to families that did actually have access to a car. And space in the vehicle is the important factor. In pre-safety-seat days, putting three young children into the back of a family car was a perfectly practical advice. Most such cars, though, can comfortably accommodate only two safety seats. So, as the child car-seat laws change, a family must wait longer time for a third child to fit in the car. Sometimes, that wait will mean no third child is ever born.
Unless, of course, the family concerned buys a bigger car. But average families have the obvious reasons not to do so — big cars cost more, and are more costly to run. Interestingly, Dr Nickerson and Dr Solomon found that the third-child deterrent (遏制作用) appears even stronger among wealthier families. As they observe, “large cars may reflect their real status and taste, which may make people unwilling to switch even when they can afford to.”
1. What is the passage mainly about?| A．Changes in American car-seat laws. |
| B．Ways to ensure children’s safety in cars. |
| C．Influence of car-seat laws on American birthrate. |
| D．The connection between cars and American birthrate. |
| A．The space of the family car. | B．The family’s economic status. |
| C．The quality of child safety seats. | D．The desire to have a third child. |
| A．They are a symbol of wealth. |
| B．They are affordable to most families. |
| C．They are more popular among richer families. |
| D．They are unable to solve child birth rates problem. |
| A．By comparing data. | B．By making surveys. |
| C．By doing experiments. | D．By holding interviews. |
【推荐2】Mattel is launching a new line of Barbies made from plastic that would otherwise become ocean waste. The "Barbie Loves the Ocean” collection, which has a summer theme, comes with three dolls （each $ 10） and a beach cabin play set （ $ 20）,. As part of Barbie's vlog （视频博客） series on YouTube, Mattel will pair the dolls' release with a new video called "Barbie Shares How We can All Protect the Planet.
The new Barbie line is Mattel's latest move in reaching its sustainability （可持续性）goals. The 76 - year - old toy company previously pledged to using 100% recycled, recyclable or bio - based plastic materials across all of its products and packaging by 2030. 4<To truly show the next generation they can be anything, we must-do our part in protecting the planet, reducing our environmental impact, and promoting sustainable everyday behaviors," Lisa McKnight, vice president at Mattel, told CNN Business.
Earlier, the toy company announced that it was launching a program called "Mattel Play- back", which encourages consumers to send Mattel their old toys, and the company can reuse the materials for future Mattel products. The program kicked off with Barbie and two other Mattel brands - Matchbox and MEGA toys - and brands will be added to the program going forward.
Mattel isn't alone in its eco -efforts, as many large toy companies are trying to become more eco - friendly after decades of relying on environmentally destructive plastic in their products and packaging. Finding alternatives to plastic is crucial to deal with climate change , and adopting “eco - friendly" marketing and products is important for companies as consumers are increasingly conscious about how their choices affect the planet.
1. What can we know about the new Barbie products from paragraph 1?| A．They will be sold on YouTube. | B．They will be released in summer. |
| C．They are cheaper than previous products. | D．They are made from ocean - bound plastic. |
| A．Committed. | B．Adapted. | C．Objected. | D．Turned. |
| A．To reach their sales target. | B．To develop more new brands. |
| C．To reduce production costs. | D．To recycle plastic materials. |
| A．The reason for toy companies to be eco - friendly. |
| B．The way of toy companies' dealing with climate change. |
| C．The environmental impact of plastic products. |
| D．The attitude of consumers towards plastic products. |
【推荐3】No longer in the pink
The world is going to have to start thinking thoroughly to save its coral reefs. Corals are comeback creatures. As the world froze and melted and sea levels rose and fell over 30,000 years, Australia's Great Barrier Reef, which is roughly the size of Italy, died and revived five times. But now, thanks to human activity, corals face the most complex mixture of conditions they have yet had to deal with.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a rise in global temperatures of 1.5°C relative to pre-industrial times could cause coral reefs to decline by 70-90%. When waters become unusually warm, corals throw out the algae, leaving reefs a ghostly white. This ''bleaching'' is happening five times as often as it did in the 1970s.
Corals need protection from local sources of harm. Their ecosystems suffer from coastal currents, whether dirty water or waste from farms. Plastic and other rubbish block sunlight and spread aggressive bacteria. Governments need to carry out tighter rules on these industries, such as tougher local building codes, and to put more effort into strengthening rules against overfishing.
Many reefs that have been damaged could benefit from restoration. Coral's biodiversity offers hope, because the same coral will grow differently under different conditions. Corals of the western Pacific near Indonesia, for example, can survive higher temperatures than the same species in the eastern Pacific near Hawaii.
Stronger measures to fight against the larger threats corals face should also attract more research. Shading reefs using a polymer film as a sunscreen to cool them is under discussion for parts of the Great Barrier Reef. Other schemes to help corals involve genetic engineering, selective breeding and brightening the clouds in the sky above an area of the reef by spraying salt into the lowest ones, so that they turn away more of the sun's energy. These measures may sound extreme, but people need to get used to thinking big. Dealing with the problems caused by climate change will call for some far-reaching ideas.
1. Thorough thinking is needed to save the coral reefs because __________.| A．corals have come back in the Great Barrier Reef in Australia |
| B．corals are frozen and melted five times over 30,000 years |
| C．corals are strong enough to survive human activity |
| D．human activity are threatening the condition of coral reefs |
| A．warming | B．throwing out |
| C．whitening | D．dying |
| A．coastal water flows | B．more sunlight |
| C．waste from farms | D．bad bacteria |
| A．encourage people to come up with more ideas |
| B．introduce some advanced technological progress |
| C．raise people's awareness of protecting the environment |
| D．warn people of the threats and risks corals are facing |
