1 . A six-year-old longing to keep a unicorn in her backyard figured she’d get the hard part out of the way first.

Last November, Madeline wrote a letter to the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control with a straightforward request. “Dear LA County, I would like your approval if I can have a unicorn in my backyard if I can find one. Please send me a letter in response.”

Director Mayeda replied two weeks later. The department does in fact license unicorns, she said, under certain conditions. Those include polishing the unicorn’s horn at least once a month with a soft cloth, feeding it watermelon at least once a week, covering it with only nontoxic and biodegradable sparkles and giving it regular access to sunlight, moonbeams and rainbows. And, because unicorns are indeed very rare to find, the department is also giving Madeline a toy unicorn to keep her company during her search, as a token of appreciation.

“It is always rewarding to hear from young people who thoughtfully consider the requirements of providing a loving home for animals,” Mayeda wrote in the letter. “I like your sense of responsible pet ownership to seek permission in advance to keep a unicorn in Los Angeles County.”

Mayeda told the Washington Post that this is the first time the department has received a request for a license for a unicorn or any mythical creature. They were impressed with the first-grader for wanting to ask permission in the first place, and doing her research to work out how to go about that. She and her colleagues deal with a lot of “life-and-death” issues on the job, whether that’s seeing cases of animal abuse or animals hurting people or making decisions about having to put down dangerous or sick animals. So Madeline’s letter has considerably brightened their spirits, and she is due to visit the department this week to discuss her unicorn license application. Safe to say, she’s in for a magical surprise.

1. Why did Madeline write the letter?

A．To apply to visit a unicorn.	B．To learn to provide animal care.
C．To ask permission to keep a pet.	D．To figure out how to find a unicorn.

2. What can we learn from paragraph 3?

A．Her application was disapproved.	B．Requirements should be met for the license.
C．She was presented with a live unicorn.	D．Guidance was given for her search.

3. Which of the following best describes Mayeda?

A．Imaginative.

B．Sensitive.

C．Flexible.

D．Convincing.

4. Why does the department think the letter “has brightened their spirits”?

A．Because it is the first application letter for a pet.

B．Because animal protection is a life-and-death issue.

C．Because they are worn out with their daily work.

D．Because they are touched with the girl’s deeds.

2 . The Last Straw?

Every second, the world uses 160,000 plastic bags — that is a total of over five trillion per year. Up to 99 percent of these plastic bags hang around for at least 1,000 years and pollute Earth. And yet, plastic bags are hardly a necessity in our lives. Of all the changes we could make to create a more sustainable lifestyle, a total ban on plastic bags should be simple.

At the beginning of 2021, Shanghai put in effect a ban on all plastic bags in shopping malls and supermarkets, as well as a ban on non-degradable plastics in many other areas. Over the years, individuals and companies have worked to replace plastic items, such as cups and straws, with paper ones.     1    .

Customers complain that paper straws often become soft and break before they can finish their hot drinks. Experts, however, have repeatedly stressed plastic substitutes (替代品) are not the ultimate solution, and that our consumption habits need a bigger change.

In college, one of my environmental science professors promoted a type of waste-free living. She carried around a small glass jar with her, and in it was all her trash she collected for the entire year. She was able to do this by bringing her own cup to Starbucks, her own bags to the shops, and never buying anything that came wrapped in plastic. Her food waste also became compost.     2    .

Plastic bags are incredibly easy to forget about when they become increasingly common.     3    . Once they are in the trash, we take it for granted that they are someone else’s problem. The sad fact is that plastic bags break down into microplastics which then get mixed into the air, soil and water, and eventually end up in plants, animals, and our very own human bodies. So what are you going to do about them?

A．Clearly she demonstrated our ability to live a completely healthy life without creating a great deal of plastic waste.

B．Plastic bag litter has even caused great problems in some areas.

C．If they’re free to use and easily disposed of, they’re a mere tool that we don’t have to think about.

D．Some of these decisions have been met with criticism.

E．Unfortunately, such a high level of pollution doesn’t come without consequences.

3 . Chemists in mid-1500s Nuremburg had discovered that bird droppings were a rich source of saltpetre, a vital ingredient in the making of gunpowder. As a consequence pigeon droppings used to be almost as valuable as silver. Understandably, by the middle of the following century, there were an estimated 26,000 pigeon houses in Britain.

The practice of keeping the pigeon was introduced to Britain by the Romans. The Normans kept pigeons in specially constructed niches in castles and courtyards. When the pigeon houses in Britain were built, they were a vital source of meat and feathers. The latter were particularly prized as a source of warmth. Droppings gathered from the pigeon houses was a rich fertilizer, too.

The pigeon house was not only a source of food and revenue in medieval times, but also a status symbol. The privilege of building or owning pigeon houses was reserved for the rich. Towards the end of her rule, Queen Elizabeth I decided to open pigeon-breeding to the free market. Then, pigeon houses sprang up all over the countryside.

The number of pigeon houses across the British countryside was not universally welcomed. Each day the birds flew off to feed themselves on other people’s crops. By the middle of the 17th century, the problem of pigeons was so great that people feared that the destructive pigeons would turn England into a desert.

Luckily, an agricultural revolutionary, Charles Townsend, had introduced the turnip to Britain around 1700, keeping farm livestock fat enough to eat through the dark winter months. Later, vast quantities of natural saltpetre were discovered in Chile and California. Keeping pigeons went out of fashion.

Now, the homeless pigeons flew off to find somewhere else to live. One species discovered that Britain’s rapidly growing towns and cities were full of the sort of rock-faces they liked to rest on—humans called them “buildings”. Over time they’d become the wild urban pigeon that we know today.

1. Which of the following people in Britain would be least likely to keep pigeons in the late Middle Ages?

A．Fruit growers.

B．The nobles.

C．Gunpowder makers.

D．The miners.

2. What can be inferred from the passage?

A．Farm livestock used to be too thin for lack of food in the dark months in Britain.

B．Townsend revolutionized agricultural development in Britain around 1700.

C．The Normans set an undesirable example of raising pigeons for the British people.

D．England was once faced with the threat of disappearance because of pigeons.

3. According to the passage, why are there so many pigeons in the cities in Britain today?

A．Because people think it a sign of status and keep them to show off.

B．Because pigeons like to stay on hard surfaces which can be abundantly found in cities.

C．Because pigeons find enough food supplies when tourists and citizens feed them in squares.

D．Because the government encourages pigeon raising as a profitable investment.

4. Which is the best title of the passage?

A．A brief history of pigeon houses in Britain.

B．From function to fashion — the pigeon houses in Britain.

C．Profitable pigeon houses in Britain.

D．Pigeon houses in Britain as valuable as silver.

4 . Directions: After reading the passage below, fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

For ages word has been going around that the dog is man’s best friend. I agree. A dog can be handy as a night watchman around the house, as a pointer on a hunting trip, as a guardian and playmate for the children. But I think that having a dog for a pet is so expensive and annoying that I can do     1     such a friend.

Providing for the dog’s needs is so expensive that the animal should be an income tax deduction. There’s the medical bill for shots to keep the animal healthy. Unless it’s kept in the house 24 hours a day, a female must be given “preventive maintenance,” a ten-to twenty-dollar investment. Otherwise,     2     you know it, you’ll have more “income tax deductions” in your family. And dogs have to eat. Don’t think you can buy a case of Ken-L-Ration and be done with it. A dog can be as particular about food as a French expert. To feed even a Chihuahua, a very small Mexican dog, you’ll spend three to five dollars     3     week. If you own a big dog, you need a large dog-house. They’re expensive. A carpenter will build a luxurious model for about seventy-five dollars. For about thirty dollars’ worth of materials, a weekend’s work, and a smashed thumb, you can build a simple one     4     . And these are only the major costs.

A dog is so annoying that no one in his right mind would want to own one.     5     (consider) the dog owner blessed with a dog that fetches slippers, rubber toys, newspapers. Have you eased your bare feet into slippers bitten by dogs, seen a living room destroyed by a toy boxer, tried to read a newspaper chewed to wet pieces by an obedient Boston bull? And dogs make noise. Some huge dogs bark all night. But you aren’t the only one     6     (endure) sleepless nights; your neighbors let you know they didn’t sleep either. Policemen are frequent visitors to dog owners’ homes. They inquire about holes     7     (report) dug in neighbors’ flower beds, prize cats injured and bleeding, and pet chickens and ducks sent to their reward. Suspect: your dog! You deny everything, of course. Rex, you assure the officers, was asleep by the door. But you secretly suspect him, because you don’t really know where Rex was all week. And you remember     8     (wonder) why feathers were floating in his water bowl yesterday. Dogs are annoying. Neither a fire-breathing mother-in-law nor a talkative wife will prove more annoying to a man than a dog.

Dog lovers will, of course, claim my argument one-sided, even exaggerated. They might consider me as cruel as the Russians,     9     possibly attempting to solve their own canine crisis — shot Fido into orbit. But the fact remains: if our     10     (good) friends caused us the expense and annoyance our dog does, we’d soon encourage them to become astronauts.

5 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. association B. contribution C. effectively D. evolutionarily E. grasp F. immature G. joyous H. logged I. selected J. skilled K. treat

Puppies Understand You Even at a Young Age

We like to think our puppies can follow what we're telling them. Well, to some degree they can, even when they're     1    . We have known for a long time that adult dogs are especially     2     in understanding cooperative communication from humans. They can spontaneously follow a human pointing gesture. They're even better at it than apes, which are much more closely related to us,    3     speaking.

But is it a skill dogs pick up simply by spending time with people? Or is it a trait that was     4     for when dogs first became domesticated?

To find out, Bray and her colleagues     5     time with 375 puppies that were going to be trained to be service dogs. By working with pups that had spent most of their young lives with their owners, Bray could figure out whether dogs had to learn to     6     human communications -or if it's something they were born with.

The pups participated in tests designed to assess dogs1 social smarts. In one experiment, a researcher would hide food under one of two cups - and then call to the puppy and point toward the cup that held the     7    . They found puppies were able to use this social signal     8     to choose the correct location.

In another experiment, a researcher would talk to a puppy. “Hi pup. Are you a good puppy? Yes, you are! What a good puppy! ”This goes on for about 30 seconds. During this interaction, the researcher would record how much time the pup spent gazing at her with     9     sight.

They found that puppies would respond to human social gaze and could successfully use information given by a human in social context from a very young age. “It seems likely that puppies really are starting the (ask with the communicative ability necessary to be successful rather than just quickly learning a(n)    10     over the course of the task.” Bray added. All these findings suggest that dogs are biologically prepared for communication with humans.

6 . Directions:Complete the following sentences by using the proper form of the words or expressions   given in the frame.Each one can only be used once.

A. capable        B. effectiveness       C. employing        D.exposure          E.famously           F. joining          G. limitation        H. minimal       I.precisely        J.recognizing       K.worthwhile

Clean Air Act

The air in modern homes and offices is pretty clean,but not as clean as it might be.Often it contains small amounts of volatile(挥发性的）,poisonous,organic compounds.Long-term    1     to these is a bad thing,so clearing them out of the air people breathe is widely accepted as     2    

Finding an effective way to do so has proved difficult.But Stuart Strand, Long Zhang and Ryan Routsong, of the University of Washington,in Seattle,think they have succeeded,As they report in Environmental Science and Technology, their method involves     3     a gene from a rabbit into a popular indoor plant nicknamed Devil's vine—a type of ivy hat is so called because it is    4     difficult to kill.

The idea of     5     plants to de- pollute   the atmosphere inside buildings has been around for decades-but has met with only qualified success. One experiment involving unmodified spider plants,for example,showed that they are indeed     6     of removing formaldhyde (甲醛) from the air.The     7     is that to make much of a difference in a space as large as a house would require turning most of the rooms into spider-plant forests.

Dr Strand, Dr Zhang and Mr Routsong thus sought something suitably transgenic ( 转 基 因 的),but that does not flower indoors. The plant they settled on was Devil's vine,     8     because of its toughness.With the help of a bacterium,they were able to ferry the rabbit version of the gene into the plant's chromosomes(染色 体),and thus to,engineer a type of Devil's vine able to produce an air-cleaning substance. To test the     9     of their idea, the researchers put their modified ivy to work inside greenhouses filled with air containing high levels of harmful substances.The plants performed well,reducing the harmful substances in air to     10    .

7 . Country diary: a chainsaw massacre in the alder woods

On an overcast, drizzly afternoon at Durham Wildlife Trust’s low Barns nature _________ alder provided the brightest splash of color in the _________

A tree had been felled and sawn into _________. Chainsaw wounds on this species can look like a massacre, because soon after the timber is cut, it turns a lurid shade of red, almost like blood, in stark contrast to the battleship-grey bark, _________ those wounds, which briefly _________ raw meat, fade to orange and finally to chestnut brown.

When this reserve was established half a century ago, around old gravel pits (采沙场), some moisture-loving alders were planted to help _________ a bare, windswept site. Alder wood is one of the finest sources of charcoal, and the plantation trees are old enough now to be coppiced, to produce barbecue fuel.

There is also an important natural alder wood here, created by a cataclysm almost two and a half centuries ago, which led to the designation of the reserve as a site of special scientific interest.

The Great Flood of 1771 _________ Weardale, washing away bridges all the way to the coast. When the water subsided, the course of the River Wear had _________ half a mile south, and the old riverbed became what is now the reserve’s Long Alder Wood, the finest example of its kind in the region.

When it sometimes floods, this tangle of gnarled（苍劲嶙峋的） trees has a _________ of the Florida Everglades（佛罗里达大沼泽） about it, with mossy, fallen trunks sinking back into the ooze (淤泥). Year round, there are wonderful __________ to watch birds from an embankment level with the tree canopy. This afternoon an acrobatic flock of about 30 goldfinches（金翅雀）__________ and chattered through the twigs, feeding on tiny seeds that fall from the woody cones.

Sadly, since the mid-1990s, another__________ has befallen this locally __________ woodland: alder dieback disease has killed around half the mature trees. Coppicing is leading to some regeneration, though in this precious __________ dead timber is allowed to lay where it falls, reserved for the needs of a __________ community of fungi, invertebrates and woodpeckers, rather than back-garden burger-flippers on summer evenings.

1.

A．reserve

B．preserve

C．conserve

D．deserve

2.

A．scene

B．view

C．scope

D．landscape

3.

A．logs

B．materials

C．resources

D．sources

4.

A．Everlastingly

B．Eventually

C．Continually

D．Sustainably

5.

A．assemble

B．present

C．overcast

D．resemble

6.

A．rejuvenate

B．revenge

C．reform

D．remain

7.

A．gone through

B．got through

C．swept through

D．cut through

8.

A．changed

B．shifted

C．reversed

D．revised

9.

A．clue

B．plot

C．evidence

D．hint

10.

A．opportunities

B．possibilities

C．alternatives

D．probabilities

11.

A．schemed

B．crawled

C．bounced

D．scattered

12.

A．misfortune

B．catastrophe

C．setback

D．adversity

13.

A．unique

B．peculiar

C．especial

D．particular

14.

A．frontier

B．territory

C．habitat

D．boundary

15.

A．various

B．versatile

C．multiple

D．diverse