【推荐1】A successful move of 21 eastern black rhinos (犀牛) to a new home of a grassy plateau that hasn’t seen them in decades will give them space to live and help increase the population of the critically endangered animals. It was Kenya’s biggest rhino relocation ever.

The rhinos were taken from three parks that are becoming overcrowded to the private Loisaba Conservancy, where rhinos were wiped out by poaching (偷猎) decades ago.

The 18-day exercise involved tracking the rhinos using a helicopter and then shooting them with tranquilizer darts(麻醉飞镖). Then the animals—which weigh about a ton each—have to be loaded into the back of a truck for the move. Disaster nearly struck early in the relocation effort, when a tranquilized rhino fell into a river. Workers held the rhino’s head above water with a rope to stop it from drowning while the tranquilizer drug took effect, and then the rhino was freed.

Some of the rhinos were transferred from Nairobi National Park and made a 300-kilometer trip. Others came from two parks closer to Loisaba.

Rhinos are generally animals enjoying being alone and are at their happiest in large living areas. As numbers in the three parks where the rhinos were moved from have increased, wildlife officials decided to relocate some in the hope that they will be happier and more likely to increase. David Ndere, an expert on rhinos at the Kenya Wildlife Service, said their reproduction rates decrease when there are too many in a territory.

Kenya has had relative success in recovering its black rhino population, which dipped from around 20, 000 in the 1970s to below 300 in the mid-1980s because of hunting, according to conservationists, raising fears that the animals might be wiped out completely in the country. Kenya now has around 1, 000 black rhinos, the third biggest population behind South Africa and Namibia. There are just over 6, 400 wild black rhinos left in the world, all of them in Africa, according to the Save the Rhino organization.

1. What’s the reason why the rhinos were moved to a new home?

A．Locals’ deadly effects.	B．Their limited living space.
C．Their too large population.	D．Their preference for a grassy plateau.

2. What can we infer about the rhinos’ move from Paragraph 3?

A．Moving rhinos safely was a very serious challenge.

B．The method of transporting rhinos was too backward.

C．Many disasters happened during the rhino relocation.

D．Most rhinos in the three parks migrated on their own.

3. What does the Kenya government hope to achieve from the rhino’s move?

A．A reintroduction of an endangered animal.	B．A gradual increase of the rhino population.
C．A much larger national natural park in Kenya.	D．A more booming tourism with rhino exhibitions.

4. What can be the best title for the text?

A．Ways to Move Rhinos Safely	B．Black Rhinos’Situation in Kenya
C．Kenya’s Biggest Rhino Relocation	D．The Black Rhino Reserves in Kenya

【推荐2】British sculptor Jason Taylor has made it his mission to use his talent to conserve our ecosystems by creating underwater museums. Over the years, the environmentalist has put over 850 massive artworks underwater worldwide. On February 1, 2021, Taylor launched his latest work---The Underwater Museum of Cannes.

“The main goal was to bring attention to the fact that our oceans need our help,” Taylor told Dezeen. “Ocean ecologies have been destroyed by human activity in the Mediterranean over the past few decades, and it is not obvious what is taking place when observing the sea from afar.”

The Underwater Museum of Cannes contains 6 sculptures featuring local residents of various ages. They range from Maurice, an 80-year-old fisherman, to Anouk, a 9-year-old student. Towering over 6-feet-tall and weighing 10 tons, the faces are sectioned into two parts, with the outer part like a mask. The mask indicates that the world’s oceans appear powerful and unbeatable from the surface but house an ecosystem that is extremely fragile to careless human activities.

Though the waters surrounding the sculptures now appear a pristine blue, the seabed was filled with old boat engines, pipes, and other human-made trash when the project began about four years ago. Besides removing the trash, Taylor also restored the area’s seagrass. Just one square meter of the seagrass can generate up to 10 liters of oxygen daily. The seagrass also helps prevent coastal erosion and provides habitats for many ocean creatures.

“The idea of creating an underwater museum was to draw more people underwater and develop a sense of care and protection,” Taylor told Dezeen. “If we threw unwanted waste near a forest, there would be a public outcry. But this is happening every day in our surrounding waters and it largely goes unnoticed.”

1. What are the underwater museums intended to do?

A．To make huge profits.	B．To raise awareness of protecting the ocean.
C．To show Jason Taylor’s talent.	D．To draw attention to endangered sea animals.

2. Why does the outer part of the sculptures look like a mask?

A．To popularize the features of the locals.

B．To remind people to protect themselves.

C．To reflect people’s protection of the ocean.

D．To stress the sensitiveness of the ecosystem.

3. What’s Paragraph 4 mainly about?

A．How the project was started.	B．How the seagrass was restored.
C．What recovery effort the project made.	D．Why the surroundings were improved.

4. What can we infer from what Jason Taylor said in the last paragraph?

A．The situation of the ocean is easily ignored.

B．The destruction caused to the ocean is noticeable.

C．Forests play a more important role in ecosystems.

D．People have zero tolerance to damage done to nature.

【推荐3】The oceans occupy most of the Earth's surface — about 70% — to the point of giving our planet its unmistakable colour.As such, they can tell the state of the Earth's health: to observe them is to know where we stand.

In terms of climate, the warming and acidification of the oceans have harmful consequences for marine life and for land: there is of course the rise in water levels which threatens communities settling along the coasts.There is also a risk that is even more worrying since the oceans are no longer able to perform the climate regulation function that they have long fulfilled.As far as biodiversity（生物多样性）is concerned, the diagnosis is even more alarming.

We are well aware of these interacting crises, in particular thanks to the work of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO.We also know where we must act.However, we still have to reflect matters and cooperate widely in order to manage the unavoidable and prevent the uncorrectable.

COVID-19 affords us this opportunity to come together and set up ambitious programmes of action.This is true for climate; it is true for biodiversity; it is also true for the oceans, as the United Nations Special Envoy for the Ocean, Peter Thomson, explained: “If there were ever a tide in human affairs that should be taken, this is it.”

It is indeed our responsibility to seize this moment.We must firstly learn more about the depths, which remain largely unknown to us and still hold many secrets that only we can reveal.Secondly, we must give free rein to imagination and innovation, which we need in order to deal with this worrying situation.This is why we have made innovation the theme of 2020 World Oceans Day.We must also seize this moment to sound the alarm, perhaps more widely than we have done so far, because no technical solution can replace a widespread, personal understanding of the threats to the oceans, their mysteries and their beauty.

1. What has made people worried about the oceans according to Paragraph 2?

A．So many living things disappear in the oceans.

B．The oceans fail to work properly as they used to.

C．Water levels may rise at a fast speed.

D．Human activities can't be prevented in a way.

2. What does the underlined phrase “give free rein to” probably mean?

A．Place a restriction on.

B．Be in possession of.

C．Give complete freedom to.

D．Pay no attention to.