1 . The suburb I live in backs on to a large nature reserve. One morning I saw a koala (考拉) sitting in a palm tree in my front yard. I phoned around to ask what I could _________ this koala, but no one wanted to know. I ended up _________ the koala out of my tree and we crossed the road _________ for him to return to the nature reserve.

I’ve always been befriending animals. As a young kid I used to pick up lizard eggs and _________ them. It stimulated my interest as to why there wasn’t anyone wanting to come and _________this koala in my tree. After that, I signed up for all the _________I could find.

Once I had accreditation (合格证 ), I volunteered with the RSPCA in 2019, rehabilitating (使康复) wildlife. I was an ambulance driver, _________ overnight rescues. We rescued hundreds of animals and _________ more.

I cut the leaves of the eucalyptus trees for the koalas to eat and look after the __________ wildlife at our centre. If they recover, they are __________ back to where they come from.

As a kid I would never have imagined doing this. I feel like I’m the __________ girl on the planet that I get to do what I love. I believe it’s my __________.

After Japan discharged nuclear wastewater, people are terribly worried about more animals, especially marine animals. Any animal has the right to survive and the Earth is our common home. Please care for our animal friends.

2 . Right now, summers are getting hotter, winters colder and the polar ice is melting at an alarming rate. Extreme weather events and natural disasters frequently occur. The climate time-bomb is ticking. Strict measures must be taken to tackle the problem.

It reminds me of how the lives we live seem to follow roughly in the way put forward years earlier by the writers of science-fiction. I guess it’s “life imitating art”. When I was young there were stories about rockets going into space and even going to the moon, although there had never been a rocket into space at that time. Years later, Russia launched Sputnik, the first man-made object to go into earth orbit and later the US landed people and even a car on the moon.

When I was growing up there were also science-fiction stories about governments looking for solutions when the world’s natural resources were being over-extended, such as they are in the case of climate change. The solution in the stories was to assume that the cause of the problem was over-population and the solution, therefore, was to limit the number of people. Various plans were put forward for doing that, from limiting the birth rate to killing off anyone over a certain age. That age, if I remember correctly, was usually about 60 and when you reached that you were supposed to turn yourself over to a government facility where you would be put to death.

Still, a look at the old science-fiction stories provides an interesting and somewhat chilling approach to what is acknowledged to be a very serious and worsening world-wide problem. There is general agreement that urgent action is needed to stop us from literally making our world unfit to live on. The answers, at least so far, concentrate on managing those resources and the ways in which we use them However, I wonder if the day will come when life will imitate the art of the old science-fiction stories and someone will propose limiting the number of people on the planet as a way of making it more suitable for those who are left. It’s a grave thing to predict.

5 . In mainland Britain, people who has ever attempted to grow berries or nuts — or indeed feed the bird — will know, doing so is identical to an opening move in a game of chess with local grey squirrels, a game the squirrels tend to win. Grey squirrels are also fond of the occasional bird’s eggs or the young birds, and enjoy tearing and eating the bark of young broadleaf trees, which can either kill the trees or leave them open to infection. This, apart from affecting biodiversity and the landscape, harms the wood industry. The loss — in damaged timber, lost carbon revenue and tree replacements — is not insignificant: £37 a year in England and Wales.

Grey squirrels (Sciurus carolinensis), introduced from North America in 1876, have nearly replaced the native red squirrels (Sciurus vulgaris) in Britain by outcompeting them for food and habitat. They are larger, and stronger, and resistant to squirrel pox virus, while reds are not. About 3 million now live in the UK; the International Union for Conservation of Nature lists the grey squirrel among the top 100 most harmful invasive species in the world.

In Britain, significant efforts have been made to stop grey squirrels’ progress, including trapping, shooting, and releasing pine martens into their habitats. The latest move, a workable system for which was thought to be a decade away, is forbidding the breeding of grey squirrels. However, legal challenges brought so many delays that the invasive grey squirrels. population expanded to an unmanageable level and wiping out was abandoned. The main issue in Britain was thought to be more technological than legal — designing a drug that targets only grey squirrels to prevent them breeding. Another possibility in the years ahead is to use DNA editing to ensure grey females are born unable to give birth.

Obviously, there is a hint of xenophobia (仇外) in some discussions about the introduction of grey squirrels to Britain nearly 150 years ago which has had an impact on the local ecosystem, posing a threat to native species. It’s also worth noting that reds — which also tear bark and take eggs — were seen as pests until the early 1930s, and extensively killed. There is, too, a strong argument that ecosystems evolve naturally, and it may be impractical and unrealistic to intervenes or even resist it. The attraction of controlling the breeding of the grey squirrels is that it is less inhumane, and aims for balance rather than uprooting.

9 . Reading a pup’s body language requires experience and expert guidance. Zazie Todd, a dog trainer and founder of the blog Companion Animal Psychology, weighs in on how to decode dogs’ behaviour.

1. If your dog looks remorseful (羞愧的) when you walk in the door and see a mess…

They’re expecting punishment but don’t necessarily know that what they’ve done is wrong. Alexandra Horowitz, a professor at Barnard College in New York City whose research focuses on canine (犬科) cognition, put that ”guilty” look to the test in 2009.     1     Subsequent research out of the University of Cambridge found no evidence that dogs can even feel guilty.

2. If your dog licks their mouth…

They’re stressed Recently, two European studies have highlighted the meaning of this licking.     2     The other determined that dogs lick their mouths—and also look away—in response to a mild threat. If you spot this sign, try reducing your dog’s stress levels.     3    

3. If you’re at the vet and your dog’s tail is down…

They’re anxious. Obvious signs of an unhappy dog include hiding or trying to leave the exam room, but commonly missed triggers range from a tucked tail and lowered ears to trembling.     4     Many vets now use food to make the experience more fun.

4. If your dog leans into you during a petting session…

They like it! If you’re unsure that a dog is enjoying being petted, stop, then gauge their reaction. This is called a consent test. If they choose to wander off, the session is over.     5     Preferred spots on their bodies are to either side of the chest and under the chin.

10 . Microplastics are one of the largest environmental problems we face. They are tiny bits of plastics less than 5 mm long. Now a tiny robotic fish that might help tackle one of the problems of plastic pollution has been invented by scientists in China.

The bionic little swimmers have been programmed to wiggle their way through water collecting microplastics as they go. The robofish are only 15mm long. Yet, they can travel quite quickly as they clean. They move by flashing a laser on and off in their tails. It causes the tail to flap side to side which drives the ‘fish’ forward through the water. As they swim along, any nearby microplastics get drawn towards the robots and stick to them.

Not only is their shape inspired by marine life but also is the material they are made out of. Instead of being made out of the traditional materials used for soft robots that can be damaged easily in the water, this one was made from a material that takes inspiration from mother-of-pearl. Mother-of-pearl is found on the inside surface of clam (蛤蜊) shells. As well as attracting microplastics, the material could also heal itself after being cut, still maintaining its ability to absorb microplastics. Because it’s so durable and can swim as fast as it does(for how small it is), the researchers say that it could be used for monitoring microplastics and other pollutants in the hard-to-reach places of complex underwater environments.

Microplastics have been found nearly everywhere. They’ve been found in our oceans, on top of mountains, in some of the food we eat and even in the stomachs of some marine animals. One of the biggest problems with microplastics is, because of their size, they are difficult to clean up. This is especially true of microplastics in the ocean. The scientists hope that their tiny fish-shaped robots can one day help tackle this global problem. At the moment, the robofish are something called proof of concept. It just means that the scientists were able to make something that proves their idea worked.

Now that the team has shown that their idea works, they are going to keep working on it. They hope to create new versions that can dive deeper and absorb more microplastics.