1 . A new study from the University of Cambridge shows how small environmental changes can have great effects on human behavior. Even the rise of skateboarding is the result of the deep relationships between humans and the climate.

“To make connections between climate and society, we often look into the past, but as we go further back, the evidence gets thinner,” said lead author Professor Büntgen. “We wanted to find a more modern example where we had lots of data to look at. That is how we began to study skateboarding.”

As was recorded, the prosperity (繁荣) of post-war America resulted in the building of more than 150,000 swimming pools in California during the 1960s. However, California suffered the greatest drought (旱灾) in the 1970s. The government’s water agencies responded by mandating strict cuts, including a ban stopping people from filling backyard swimming pools. As a result, many of these pools were empty, making them ideal playgrounds for freestyle skateboarders. Naturally, skateboarding exploded in popularity.

Büntgen said, “California used to be the center of US surf culture. The popularity and influence of surf culture was very important to the rise of skateboarding, which is why it could have only happened in California. You could have had the same drought, the same pools in somewhere like Phoenix, but since Phoenix doesn’t have a rich surf culture, professional skateboarding couldn’t have started there.”

With the rise of professional skateboarding came the industrial production of polyurethane (聚氨酯) wheels, which allowed skaters to make faster turns at higher speeds than they could with earlier steel wheels. All these factors made skateboarding more popular. Nowadays, it is a multibillion-dollar industry.

The example of California best shows that local climate change can have major effects on human society.

4 . Climate change is not only a human problem; animals have to adapt to it as well. Some “warm-blooded” animals are shapeshifting (变形) and getting larger legs, ears, and beak s to better control their body temperatures as the planet gets hotter. Bird researcher Sara Ryding of Deakin University in Australia describes these changes in a review.

“It’s high time we recognized that animals also have to adapt to these changes, and this is occurring over a far shorter time than would have occurred through most of evolutionary time,” says Ryding. “The climate change that we have created is putting a lot of pressure on them, and while some species will adapt, others will not.”

Ryding notes that climate change is a complex phenomenon that’s been occurring gradually, so it’s difficult to determine just one cause of the shapeshifting. But these changes have been occurring across wide geographical regions and among a variety of species, so there is little in common apart from climate change.

Strong shapeshifting has particularly been reported in birds. Several species of Australian parrot have shown, on average, a 4% to 10% increase in size since 1871, and this is positively associated with the summer temperature each year. North American dark-eyed juncos, a type of small songbird, had a link between increased size and short-term temperature extremes in cold environments. There have also been reported changes in mammalian (哺乳动物) species. Researchers have reported tail length increases in wood mice. “The increases in appendage (附肢) size we see so far are quite small — less than 10% — so the changes are unlikely to be immediately noticeable,” says Ryding. “However, prominent (突起的) appendages such as ears are predicted to increase.”

Next, Ryding intends to investigate shapeshifting in Australian birds by 3D scanning museum bird samples from the past 100 years. Undoubtedly, it will give her team a better understanding of which birds are changing appendage size due to climate change and why.

5 . Hummingbirds (蜂鸟) are a very important part of Mexico’s ecosystem, but because of the ever-spreading city landscape, they face all sorts of serious dangers. That’s where 73-year-old Catia Lattouf de Arida comes in. As a self-taught hummingbird care-taker, she devotes most of her free time and resources to nursing the tiny birds back to health. Her home in Mexico City has become known as a hummingbird hospital

Catia’s story as a hummingbird nurse began in 2011, at a very dificult moment in her life. At that time, she focused on her battle with cancer and fell into a depression (抑郁) . She was walking on the strect one day when she noticed a hummingbird that had suffered a serious eye injury. The kindhearted woman took it home and named it Gucci. She managed to nurse Gucci back to health, but she said it was Gucci that saved her. Why? Because the hummingbird managed to pull her out of the sadness and loneliness that had taken over her life.

Word of her success spread among Catia’s friends, and before long some of them began bringing her injured hummingbirds. She didn’t repulse them at all. She began to study the bird and their habits in order to better take care of them, and after 11 years of experience, the 73-year-old woman is considered an expert on hummingbirds.

In order to raise awareness of the difficult situation of hummingbirds in Mexico, Catia Lattouf de Arida started posting videos of the patients in her Mexico City apartment on social media, and many of them became popular. That’s when the need for her nursing services really blew up. She has cared for hundreds of hummingbirds in her 11-year career, when she has had as many as 50 of them in her apartment at any one time. She spends pretty much all her time looking after the tiny birds.

7 . After my diagnosis (诊断) with a cancer, I loved the ________ of having something new and green around. My wife, Hannah, bought me what she said was a lucky bamboo plant in a deep-green pottery bowl. We placed the plant in the living room. I ________ every time I looked at it from the sofa where I spent most of my time.

I told Hannah I wanted to ________ the plant myself. I was pleased when it didn’t immediately turn yellow or brown or ________ all its leaves.

The cancer ________ my ability to walk, and the treatment left me ________, making it hard for me to perform everyday tasks. Since my diagnosis in August 2018, far too often, it seemed that I had to depend on help from other people. The huge ________ left me feeling upset. ________, caring for the plant gave me a sense of ________ at a time when I sometimes felt ________.

Before I fell sick, I had worked as a family doctor. I was used to being the one who ________ care, not the one who received it. Watering the plant, as small an act as it was, connected me to my old _______ and taught me I could still be a caregiver. Plants and ________ could still depend on me.

Over the next few months, I recovered from surgery and ________ work. Now I keep a few pots of lucky bamboo in my clinic. Sometimes, I will give one to my patients, telling them, “Take care of it. It ________ you!”

8 . On January 3, Preet Chandi made history by becoming the first woman to complete a solo expedition across Antarctica to the South Pole.

Chandi, who calls herself Summit Preet, ______ her journey on November 24, 2021. Chandi once said she chose Antarctica because she wanted to ______ others.

“I want my eight-year-old niece to grow up without ______, knowing the possibilities of what you can achieve in life are ______,” Chandi said. She spent two years ______ for the final trip.

Chandi ______ a total of 700 miles in 40 days, arriving five days ahead of time. She faced winds of 60 miles per hour and temperatures of -50℃ while ______ a 90-kilogram sled (雪橇). Along the way, Chandi ______ daily voice messages, which you can hear on her website. In her final voice recording, Chandi said, “This expedition was always about so much ______ me. I wanted to encourage people to ______ boundaries and believe in themselves. I’m really proud that I’m an Indian woman doing something ______.” She added, “Everybody starts ______, and the more you try, the more you realize you’re ______ of.”

Chandi now ______ to set up an “adventure grant”, using money raised for the trip. This grant will give money to women of any age or background who want to go on an adventure. “It can be for any adventure they want to do, any ______ adventure that is pushing some kind of boundary,” Chandi told CNN. “It doesn’t have to be a polar expedition. And I really hope that this is something that will continue year after year.”

10 . Cackles was my favorite goose. I was proud of her. Few people I knew had geese. It was_________in the 80s to have geese, especially where we lived. But we_________a few on a small piece of land.

I was most _________when I had my birthday parties. They were so different from my friends’ _________ . On the way home from school, we would collect grass and return to my garden in small groups, ready to _________the beautiful birds. The children weren’t as _________as their parents. Some had a good_________ - my uncle once got bitten by our bad-tempered male goose.

I remember being scared of them before I learned to stand my ground. As they_________me from behind, I would turn and they would stop, as if they had run into a cartoon wall. “You just have to_________them,” I would tell friends. “Don’t run.” Easier said than done.

One day, I came home to find that Cackles was being __________ . She had chased a woman down the road. The woman had been “frightened”. I was__________: “Why did she__________from a goose?”

My dad said Cackles had to__________. I last saw her in my dad’s van (运货车). It was a strange and memorable sight for all the wrong reasons. I was__________.

My dad__________me that she went to a local farm for a happy retirement. I chose to believe him.