2 .

A street dog was adopted (领养) by the workers of a bank in Dalian, Liaoning Province. She has become known as a lucky dog and has brought new clients (客户) for the bank.

This yellow and white dog is called Meili. She showed up in the neighborhood with a broken ear about six years ago. She had no home and looked for food here and there when she was hungry then. Some bank workers began to feed her. Day by day, she seemed to become a member of the bank.

Meili is smart and cute. She is such a friendly dog that she never barks (吠叫) at anyone. Instead, she likes getting close to people. If you ask her to shake hands, she usually raises a front paw (爪).

One morning, Zhang Yi, a worker of the bank, was taking care of Meili in front of the gate of the bank. Several people stopped to greet them like old friends. “Because of the shared love of dogs, we communicate more with people living nearby, and over 30 of them have become new depositors (储户) thanks to Meili,” Zhang said.

The bank workers pay for Meili’s health check, food and cleaning. Sometimes, people also buy snacks from the market for Meili. Their love brightens the dog’s life, making her life happier and more comfortable. The dog’s appearance also connects the bank with people living nearby, bringing more clients for the bank.

5 . Many pandas are sent to other countries. They play an important role in China’s and other counties’ relationship. Here is some information about pandas in different counties.

Place	name	Year left China	Information	Photo
South Korea	Ai Bao	2016	Her son Fu Bao is the first panda born in South Korea.
the United States	Ya Ya	2003	Ya Ya, who is 22, has skin illness. Beijing Zoo is ready to welcome Ya Ya back from the US.
Russia	Ru Yi	2019	The Moscow Zoo prepares food and decorations (装饰) for Ru Yi to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year.

Emperor penguins (帝企鹅) are the world’s largest penguins. Now, there     1     (be) over 600,000 of them worldwide. But a new study says that because of global warming, 70 percent of the penguins may become endangered (濒危的) by 2050.

Stephanie Jenouvrier is a penguin expert. She says that global warming is harmful to the penguins’ sea ice environment. Emperor penguins need sea ice to produce babies (生宝宝), find food and keep away     2     other animals.     3     the world’s temperature continues to rise, more sea ice will be damaged (损坏). And emperor penguins may     4     (appear) in the future.

Emperor penguins produce babies only in winter. Temperatures are low and winds are strong then. Newborn penguins have to stay together to keep     5     (they) warm. But in 2006, the sea ice in Halley Bay broke up much     6     (early) than usual. As a result, about 10,000 baby birds     7     (die) in the water that year.

    8     (lucky), experts have already been aware (意识到) of the problem. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service recently made a plan to put emperor penguins on the list of the Endangered Species Act. “The listing of emperor penguins serves as     9     alarm bell, but also a call to action. It is necessary for us     10     (take) action now to protect the penguins,” one expert says.

7 . Ants are everywhere. They live in forests, fields, deserts and cities, all over the Earth. But how much do you know about them?

Ants are social animals. They live and work in groups. They always build nests, find food, and raise babies together. They have their own colonies (群体). Ant colonies are large or small, from just a few ones to millions!

Usually, ants are divided into (被分成) several different classes (等级) such as queens, workers, males and so on. Queens are females and they eat more as larvae (幼虫). Queen ants are usually the biggest ants in colonies. They lay all the eggs. A queen ant can live for several tens of years. Males have wings and they never help with the chores. They can only live for a few weeks. Workers are females and they eat less as larvae. Workers do all the “housework” from building and cleaning the nest to collecting food. Workers are wingless and usually live for several months.

Ants are also clever architects. They can build their homes in different places. You may find their nests under rocks or in the trees. What’s more, the nests that they build are perfect for ant larvae to grow up. One ant by itself cannot do much harm to many larger animals. But they can beat much bigger and stronger enemies in large groups. By acting together, ants can even protect their colonies against animals. If you are lucky enough, you may see such a wonderful fight!

Ants are successful in the animal world. But have you learned the secret behind their success?

Scooter is a seven-year-old Chinese dog. His body is hairless, but he has long white hair on his head. His rear (后面的) legs face backward and his tongue always hangs out his mouth. Scooter’s special look won him the 2023 World’s Ugliest (最丑的) Dog competition.

Scooter may be a star now, but things didn’t always look so good for him. Since he had trouble with his rear legs from birth, he was unable to walk like other dogs. Scooter didn’t give up on himself, though. He learned to walk with the help of his two front legs. Now he can even jump to climb steps. Linda is the owner of Scooter. She looks after him very well.

The World’s Ugliest Dog competition started 50 years ago. The title may not sound very kind, but it isn’t about making fun of ugly dogs at all. Instead, this competition is to show that every dog needs love and a good home, nо matter what it looks like. For this year, at least, no dog shows those ideas better than Scooter.

People all know dogs can smell very well, so people usually use dogs to look for missing people, and to find out drugs (毒品) and even disease (疾病). But scientists weren’t sure if stressed (有压力的) people had a special smell. And if they did, they weren’t sure whether dogs could find out that smell. It shows that the answer to both questions is “yes”.

Wilson is a scientist who worked with four dogs. He taught the dogs to use a special smell-testing thing with three open boxes. Then he used meat to train (训练) the dogs to find the right box. Over time, he gave the dogs harder and harder smelling jobs. The final goal (目标) was to see if they could smell stress from a person.

With the help of other scientists, Wilson got 36 samples (样本) from different people. He got them when the people were stressed, and also when they were not. Then the dogs had to find out the stressed one. In all, the dogs did 720 of these tests. To his surprise, the dogs could find out the stressed one about 94% of the time.

The results (结果) show that stress does have a smell and dogs can know. Wilson says the news could be very useful in training service dogs, because their job is to help make that stress lower.

10 .

Funny Animal Photos
	Two monkeys are playing doctors and patients（病人）.
	The raccoon（浣熊） said   “thanks” after getting some shrimps（虾）.
	This baby owl might want to see the outside world. But its mom doesn’t seem to be very happy.
If you want to take some funny animal photos, remember to be patient（耐心的）and learn to wait for the moment. And learning about animal behaviors is helpful. Of course, luck matters, too. J