1 . High-resolution (高分辨率) satellite imagery has been used to map every single tree in Africa, showing a technique that could help improve the monitoring of deforestation (森林砍伐) across the world. Florian Reiner at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and his colleagues used images from sate lies to map canopy (树冠) across the entire African continent.

Modern sate lies usually catch tree canopies at a resolution of 30 meters — fine for measuring the size of forests, but less good at mapping individual trees. The satellite data Reiner and his colleagues used had a resolution of 3 meters, enabling the study to map all trees, including those not part of a forest.

The results suggest that 30 percent of all trees in Africa aren’t in a forest and instead are across farmland, savannah and urban areas. “Many countries in Africa lack thick forests, but have a lot of trees.” says Reiner. “These trees are extremely important to the local ecosystems, the people and the economy. By tracking every single tree, researchers can start to monitor how these trees are coping with climate change or whether they are sensitive to deforestation.” It could also improve the monitoring of reforestation efforts, which are growing in popularity as a way of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

“At a local level, being able to consistently monitor when and where trees are disappearing or reappearing can lead to more actionable insights,” says John Francis at the Alan Turing Institute in London.

“The study is a proof of concept rather than a map ready for immediate commercial use,” says Reiner. “It’s research work. It’s showing what could be done,” he says. But he is already working with colleagues to scale up the tracking approach to cover the entire global canopy: “We’re hoping that this will be seen as a way forward in monitoring tree resources.”

1. Why is high-resolution satellite imagery used to map every single tree?

A．To know the exact height of the tree.

B．To have a clear picture of the canopy.

C．To help monitor the deforestation.

D．To improve the satellite technology.

2. What is John Francis’ attitude towards the map?

A．Doubtful.

B．Disapproving.

C．Indifferent.

D．Favorable.

3. What do Reiner and his colleagues expect to do?

A．Protect the trees only in Africa.

B．Put the map into commercial use.

C．Track the entire global canopy.

D．Improve the imagery technology.

4. What is probably the best title?

A．Ways to Measure the Size of Forests in Africa

B．Coping with Climate Change by Tracking Every Single Tree

C．A Map from the Satellite Ready for Immediate Commercial Use

D．High-resolution Satellite Imagery Used in Monitoring Deforestation

2 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What has happened in the park?

A．Some flowers are dying because of the dry weather.

B．Lots of flowers are opening up.

C．Some flowers have been planted in the park.

2. For what reason does Death Valley National Park have a world record?

A．It is the hottest place in the world.

B．It is the driest place in the world.

C．It is the smallest park in the world.

3. When did the “super bloom” happen before?

A．In 2005 and 1998.

B．In 2004 and 1998.

C．In 2000 and 2005.

3 . With so many different kinds of plants out there, telling them apart can seem like an impossible task. But you don’t have to have a degree in botany to start putting names to the plants you come across. Learning to recognize various species begins with studying the plants’ unique physical features carefully and recording what you see.

    1     If you spot a plant outdoors and don’t have the first clue as to what it is, start identifying it by scanning your surroundings. In particular, consider the overall climate, the conditions of the terrain, and any nearby water sources. A quick glance should be able to tell you what you’re looking at.

Study the plant’s features carefully. Whenever you come across a species you’ve never seen before, stop and take note. Look over each of the individual parts, like the stems (茎，梗), leaves, and flowers.

    2    

Use viewing aids to take a closer look. A magnifying glass will allow you to zoom in and analyze a plant’s features in more vivid detail. Similarly, you may require a pair of binoculars or a telescopic lens when you want to inspect a particular specimen (样本) from a distance.     3    

Write down the plant’s key features.     4     Be sure to make mention of attributes like size, shape, color, and texture, as well as any unique patterns or other distinguishing marks. In order to learn to identify plants on your own, you’ll need to hone (磨练) your use of descriptive language to be as precise as possible.

Ask an expert to take advantage of their firsthand experience. Show your notes and any photos you’ve taken to a botanist, gardening specialist, or respected outdoorsman and see if they can help you discover the identity of a certain plant.     5     People who have spent years studying plants can often pick them out by sight or description.

A．Observe the plant carefully at first.

B．Take your environment into consideration.

C．Record each characteristic in your own words.

D．Judge the age and shape of the plants you have found.

E．Without these tools, you’ll be stuck doing a lot of guesswork.

F．You’ll have an opportunity to absorb a little of what they know.

G．Most plants can be grouped and distinguished by these structures.

4 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个适当的单词或括号内单词的正确形式。

China is known as the Kingdom of Bamboo because it is the country with the most bamboo in the world. More than 400 species of bamboo, one third of all known species in the world, grow in China. The areas    1    produce the most bamboo are south of Yangtze River.

Bamboo was    2    (close) connected with the daily lives of people in ancient China. Su Dongpo,    3    literary giant of the Song Dynasty, said that people could not live    4     bamboo, and people of the time used bamboo as firewood and to make tiles, paper, rafts, hats, rain capes, and    5    (shoe).

In the Han Dynasty, bamboo    6    (use) for paper making because it produced high- quality paper and was    7    (expensive);three tons of bamboo could yield one ton of paper pulp(纸浆). And bamboo is still an important raw material for paper making today. Some 1,600 years ago, people wrote with brushes on xuan paper    8    (make) from young bamboo, and xuan paper is still popular for Chinese calligraphy and paintings.

Tall and graceful with luxuriant foliage(枝叶),bamboo is an    9    (idea) plant for household courtyards and parks. It tolerates the heat of summer and the cold of winter, and it regenerates after    10    (cut).

5 . A handful of healthy soil could contain great numbers of living organisms. However, poisonous pesticides (杀虫剂) are causing harm and destruction to them, according to a recent analysis.

For the analysis, researchers looked through nearly 400 published studies including over 2,800 experiments on how pesticides affect soil organisms. They found that pesticides harmed organisms critical to maintaining healthy soils, but these harms have never been considered in the safety reviews of the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency).Poisonous pesticides are driving factors in the sharp decline of many soil organisms, such as ground beetles. They have been identified as the most significant driver of soil biodiversity loss in the last ten years.

However, that research has always been ignored. The EPA, which is responsible for pesticide supervision(监管)in the country, openly acknowledges that somewhere between 50 and 100 percent of all agriculturally applied pesticides end up on the soil. Yet, to assess pesticides’ harms to soil species, the agency just uses a single test species, the European honeybee, to estimate risk to all soil organisms. It spends its entire life above ground in artificial boxes.

Worse still, as soil health gain popularity globally, pesticide companies have jumped up to green wash and promote their products. Every major company is now advertising its role in improving soil health, such as advocating planting cover crops. As general beliefs, these practices are indeed good for soil health and, if adopted responsibly, are a great step to take. But companies know that these practices are often accompanied by increased pesticide use. Chemicals and pesticides have to be applied more frequently to kill weeds before crops are planted.

The long-term environmental cost can no longer be overlooked. Soils are some of the most complex ecosystems on Earth, containing nearly a quarter of the planet’s biodiversity. Protecting them should be a priority, not an afterthought.

1. What does the underlined word “They” refer to in Paragraph 2?

A．Soil organisms.	B．Ground beetles.
C．Artificial boxes.	D．Poisonous pesticides.

2. What can we learn from Paragraph 3?

A．The honeybee is a typical species living in nature.

B．The assessment of pesticides’ harms is one-sided.

C．Less than half of applied pesticide go to the soil eventually.

D．The EPA attaches great importance to pesticide inspection.

3. Why do pesticide companies advocate planting cover crops?

A．To obey the EPA’s rules.

B．To increase their product sales.

C．To protect the environment.

D．To shoulder their social responsibility.

4. Which of the following is a suitable title for the text?

A．Soil: essential to agriculture.

B．Pesticides: harmful to soil health.

C．Organisms: significant to harvest.

D．Pollution: destructive to biodiversity.

6 . 阅读下面短文，在空白处填入1个词(冠词，介词，代词或连词)，或在空白处填入单词的正确形式。

Plants cannot move from place to place, but seeds can. They can travel great distances. They may be carried by the wind or upon the water. They may also be carried by animals or people. Seeds     1     (carry) by the wind often have special shapes. Maple seeds have wings that spin and keep them in the air for longer, allowing them to land in all kinds of places.     2     (depend) on the strength of the wind, they can sometimes travel for hundreds of kilometres.

Coconuts are carried along by ocean     3     (current). When a coconut falls from a tree onto the beach, the sea picks     4     up at high tide and carries it away to grow somewhere else. Its hard shell allows it to float on the water for    5     long time. Another way for seeds to travel is through the digestive systems of animals. Many plants produce     6     (attract) fruits that animals like to eat. The animal receives the nutrients of the fruit,     7     it does not digest the seed, which is passed out some time     8     (late). Of course, animals move, so the seed can easily end     9     a long way away from the parent plant, especially if the fruit     10     (eat) by a bird.

7 . Five Tasks for Your Winter Garden

As autumn has come, winter is on the way. When it finally arrives, it can be cold outside. However, even a blanket of snow doesn’t stop a keen gardener.     1    . Read on to find out some main tasks for winter.

Build New Beds

If you live in a more temperate area, you can start making new beds for your vegetable garden now. Raised beds are easy and relatively inexpensive if you have plenty of homemade fertilizers.     2    , you can usually pick it up quite cheap from the city landfill.

Tend to Apples and Pears

Winter is fit to prune(修剪) apple and pear trees. You can remove the damaged and diseased branches when the trees were dormant(休眠).     3    .

    4    

Frost covering can be put over cold hard vegetables before the temperature drops too far to help keep those plants happy in winter. Frost covering can be helpful for Brussels Sprouts, kale, winter cabbage and leeks if you live in milder climates.

Take Hardwood Cuttings(插条)

    5    . Some plants in the garden which do well with hardwood cuttings include elderberry and currants. Roses, buddleia (butterfly bush) and other shrubs also propagate by these types of cuttings.

A．Cover Crops

B．If you don’t have anything to made fertilizers

C．Here are plenty of jobs you can do in the garden

D．Many bare root trees can also be planted in winter

E．Even if homemade fertilizers will be bad as it is too cold

F．Plenty of leaves help keep some hardy plants from freezing

G．Winter is a great time to multiply plants by hardwood cuttings

8 . With no special equipment, no fences and no watering, two abandoned agricultural fields in the UK have been rewilded (重新野化), in large part due to the efforts of jays, which actually “engineered” these new woodlands. Researchers now hope that rewilding projects can take a more natural and hands-off approach and that jays can shed some of their bad reputations.

The two fields, which researchers have called the New Wilderness and the Old Wilderness, had been abandoned in 1996 and 1961 respectively. The former was a bare field, while the latter was grassland—both lay next to ancient woodlands. Researchers had suspected that the fields would gradually return to wilderness, but it was impressive to see just how quickly this happened, and how much of it was owed to birds.

Using aerial data, the researchers monitored the two sites. After just 24 years, the New Wilderness had grown into a young, healthy wood with 132 live trees per hectare, over half of which (57%) were oaks. Meanwhile, the Old Wilderness resembled a mature woodland after 39 years, with 390 trees per hectare.

“This native woodland restoration was approaching the structure (but not the species composition) of long-established woodlands within six decades,” the researchers explained in the study.

Part of this reforestation was done by the wind, and researchers suspect that previous ground disturbance may have aided the woodland establishment—which is good news, as it would suggest that agricultural areas may be reforested faster than anticipated. However, animals—Eurasian jays, thrushes, wood mice, and squirrels—also played an important role in helping the forests take shape. This handful of species provided much of the natural regeneration needed for the forest to develop. Jays, in particular, seem to have done a lot of heavy lifting.

1. What does the underlined word “shed” in Paragraph 1 refer to?

A．Be opposed to.

B．Be ashamed of.

C．Get used to.

D．Get rid of.

2. Which aspect of the changes in the two fields impressed the researchers?

A．The scale of the woodlands.

B．The diversity of the fields.

C．The rate of the changes.

D．The frequency of the wilderness.

3. What does the author want to tell us by providing some data in Paragragh 3?

A．The woodland restoration was approaching the structure of long-established ones.

B．Much of the wilderness of the fields was owed to birds.

C．Previous ground disturbance aided the woodland establishment.

D．How quickly the fields returned to wilderness over time.

4. What does the last paragraph mainly talk about?

A．The essential role of humans in the reforestation.

B．The factors that contribute to the reforestation.

C．The importance of woodland establishment.

D．The threats faced by a handful of wild animals.

9 . Lichens (地衣)

Lichens look like splashes of paint left behind by a careless painter. Unlike many plants, they do not require soil to grow. They grow on trunk of trees in steaming tropical rain forests, on farmers’ fenceposts, on the bricks of big-city buildings, and on old gravestones. Lichens can tolerate extremes of climate. They grow on rocks in hot springs, on wind-swept mountaintops, and on stones in the driest deserts. In the Arctic, lichens are the principal source of food for reindeer. Whole mountainsides in Antarctica appear green and orange because of the presence of lichens; they are one of the few plants that can survive there. They are among the oldest of known plants. Recently, scientists discovered lichen fossils on a rock in a mine in southwest China that date back 600 million years.

When conditions become harsh, lichens become dormant (休眠). If there is not enough moisture, they simply dry up, but a short rain or even a heavy dew gives them new life. When growing on rock surfaces, lichens produce acids that dissolve (溶解) the minerals, contributing to the process of weathering by which rocks are slowly turned to soil. This property enables lichens to be pioneers. They appear on barren rock rubbed clean by glaciers, fires, lava flows, or floods, beginning the process of soil formation that allows mosses (苔藓) and other plants to later take root. But, despite their hardiness, lichens are extremely sensitive to airborne particles(颗粒). That’s why they serve as an early warning system for air pollution.

It is the acids lichens produce that give them their distinctive colors. Lichens are often spoken of in the same breath as mosses, and some lichens are even called mosses, but true mosses are all distinctively green, whereas lichens appear in many vivid colors. At one time, acids from lichens were used to make dyes, such as the purple dye, the blue dye, and the red dye, and they are sometimes still used that way today. Some lichens, such as oakmoss, contain oils that produce fragrant odors used in scented soaps, cosmetics and perfumes. Some lichens are also known to have antibiotic properties to kill bacteria.

So definite are the form, color, and characteristics of these organisms that for hundreds of years lichens were constantly under scientists’ microscope.

1. What characteristic of lichens is mainly talked about in paragraph 1?

A．They grow only on rock surfaces.

B．They live primarily in cold places.

C．They have adapted to a wide variety of environments.

D．They live in remote locations far from human communities.

2. The author refer to lichens as pioneers in paragraph 2 because they __________.

A．have their primitive structure

B．grow in areas before other plants do

C．are found in remote parts of the world

D．develop so early in the history of the planet

3. According to paragraph 3, humans use lichens in the following ways EXCEPT __________.

A．as a means of coloring clothing

B．as a type of medicine

C．as a source of food

D．as an ingredient in perfume

4. Which of the following cases would be probably dealt with in the next paragraph?

A．Lichens are important in Canada because of their abundance in the north.

B．Extracts of lichens were sold as herbal medicines to facilitate hair growth.

C．Glacier Park’s vast array of lichens indicate relatively good air quality.

D．A German botanist first found lichens are composed of two life forms.

10 . Covered in lush fur, the thickest in the animal kingdom, sea otters (海獭) can live their entire lives in the ocean, feeding heavily upon seafloor animals such as shellfish. They are often seen to eat clams(蛤), which bury themselves in meadows of eelgrass (大叶藻场),   a wide-ranging plant species growing in water. Eelgrass meadows where sea otters dig for clams become partly bare, which is commonly a concern for ecologists.

As it turns out, the meadows with otters are healthier, with more eelgrass, according to a new study published in Science. That's because by gently disturbing the seabed, the otters make the plants flower and produce seeds. What's more, their digging provides more space and sunlight for seeds to settle and grow. The enhanced genetic diversity caused by sea otters could make eelgrass more adaptable to present and future threats.

The finding is a powerful example of how animals such as otters influence their ecosystems beyond predation (捕食), often in unseen and little-known ways, says study leader Erin Foster, a research associate at the Hakai Institute. It also means sea otters, an endangered species, are vital to their environments and give eelgrass, which is in danger worldwide, a better chance at staying healthy and surviving.

Seagrass habitats are also important for many fish, providing food for animals, absorbing, and filtering harmful pollution and bacteria from the water. "Genetic diversity typically strengthens the adaptability of species, and considering the challenges we're facing…this will be important for eelgrass meadows, and from this aspect, the impact the otters are having deserves our lasting concern," says Foster.

1. What do we know about sea otters?

A．They live part of their lives underwater.	B．They mainly feed on sea animals like fish.
C．They eat clams beneath eelgrass meadows.	D．They become a new concern for ecologists.

2. How does the author develop paragraph 2?

A．By giving opinions.	B．By presenting reasons.
C．By clarifying concepts.	D．By comparing results.

3. Why does the author mention the endangered condition of eelgrass?

A．To provide examples of sea otters' predation.

B．To show the urgency to protect the environment.

C．To highlight the role of otters in their ecosystems.

D．To warn against the potential risk of climate change.

4. What does Foster think of the impact otters have on underwater meadows?

A．Overestimated.

B．Noteworthy.

C．Temporary.

D．Unpredictable.