1 . If humans were truly at home under the light of the moon and stars, we would go in darkness happily, the midnight world as visible to us as it is to the vast number of nocturnal (夜间活动的) species on this planet. Instead, we are diurnal creatures, with eyes adapted to living in the sun’s light. This is a basic evolutionary fact, even though most of us don’t think of ourselves as diurnal beings. Yet it’s the only way to explain what we’ve done to the night: We’ve engineered it to receive us by filling it with light.

The benefits of this kind of engineering come with consequence called light pollution whose effects scientists are only now beginning to study. Light pollution is largely the result of bad lighting design, which allows artificial light to shine outward and upward into the sky. Ill-designed lighting washes out the darkness of night and completely changes the light levels and light rhythms to which many forms of life, including ourselves, have adapted. Wherever human light spills into the natural world, some aspect of life is affected.

In most cities the sky looks as though it has been emptied of stars, leaving behind a vacant haze (霾) that mirrors our fear of the dark. We’ve grown so used to this orange haze that the original glory of an unlit night—dark enough for the planet Venus to throw shadow on Earth—is wholly beyond our experience, beyond memory almost.

We’ve lit up the night as if it were an unoccupied country, when nothing could be further from the truth. Among mammals alone, the number of nocturnal species is astonishing. Light is a powerful biological force, and on many species it acts as a magnet. The effect is so powerful that scientists speak of songbirds and seabirds being “captured” by searchlights on land or by the light from gas flares on marine oil platforms. Migrating at night, birds tend to collide with brightly lit tall buildings.

Frogs living near brightly lit highways suffer nocturnal light levels that are as much as a million times brighter than normal, throwing nearly every aspect of their behavior out of joint, including their nighttime breeding choruses. Humans are no less trapped by light pollution than the frogs. Like most other creatures, we do need darkness. Darkness is as essential to our biological welfare, to our internal clockwork, as light itself.

Living in a glare of our making, we have cut ourselves off from our evolutionary and cultural heritage—the light of the stars and the rhythms of day and night. In a very real sense light pollution causes us to lose sight of our true place in the universe, to forget the scale of our being, which is best measured against the dimensions of a deep night with the Milky Way—the edge of our galaxy—arching overhead.

2 . Growing Roots

When I was growing up, I had an old neighbor named Dr. Gibbs. He didn’t look like any doctor I’d ever known. When Dr. Gibbs wasn’t _______ lives, he was planting trees.

The good doctor had some interesting theories on planting trees. He believed in “No pains, no gains”. He never _______ his new trees, which was _______ many people. Once I asked why. He answered that watering plants spoiled them, and that if you water them, each following tree generation will grow weaker and weaker. So you have to make things _______ for them. He talked about how watering trees made for shallow roots, and how trees that weren’t watered had to grow deep roots in search of water. I came to understand that he meant deep roots were to be _______. I planted a couple of trees a few years back and I took good care of them. Two years of _______ has resulted in trees that expect to be waited on hand and foot. Whenever a cold wind blows, they shake and tremble their branches. Funny things about those trees of Dr. Gibbs’. The lack of water seemed to _______ them in ways comfort and ease never could.

I used to pray for my sons that their lives will be easy. But lately I’ve been thinking that it’s time to _______ my prayer. I know my children are going to meet _______, and I’m praying they will be strong. The prayer for comfort is seldom met. What we need to do is to pray for deep roots, so when the winds blow, they won’t be __________ away.

Most gardeners will probably say gardening is good for you. According to a study, people who garden have a     1    (healthy) diet, get more exercise, and feel less stress. Researchers studied the benefits of gardening in shared community gardens     2     people work together. They suggest gardening may reduce stress because it     3    (expose) people to nature, while community gardens also provide chances for social interaction. Therefore, they hope the results will encourage doctors and government leaders to regard community gardens as a vital part of the public health system.

5 . One winter, a homeless dog called Shavi was left to die on the streets of south-west Russia after being _______ by a driver. With two broken legs, she was taken to a pet clinic for _______ by a volunteer from One Green Planet. After launching an appeal to find someone who could look after Shavi, the vet found Nina who _______ her and nursed her back to health, working on regaining her confidence and _______.

Due to work commitments, Nina couldn’t keep Shavi and instead found her a new _______ 185 miles away, near the Russian border. However, after just a few days, Shavi _______ from there.

Two weeks later, while walking along the road outside her home, Nina felt something brush up against her leg. Realizing it was Shavi, she was so _______ and excited. The dog had made the almost 200-mile journey back to the woman who had saved her life and legs.

The pair lived together and moved into a bigger apartment so Shavi had plenty of room to play. “Of course, she has now remained with us for good. I would never give this kind of friend away again. _______ are the most loyal and loving companions in the world. For every drop of human love, they _______ give all of theirs in return, and I know that from personal experience. Shavi is just like a __________ to me.” Nina said.

The measures were effective. Up to now, the antelope population     1     and in June 2015, the Tibetan antelope     2     from the endangered species list. The government, however, does not     3     to stop the protection programmes, since the     4     to the Tibetan antelope have not yet disappeared.

Many animals and plants are endangered in the world today. These endangered species are threatened with becoming extinct, meaning they will no longer exist on Earth. Examples include the Cuban Macaw and the Sri Lankan Legume Tree. Hunting, and collecting of the Macaw bird for pets, led to its extinction. While the main reason the native Sri Lankan Legume Tree went extinct was due to habitat loss from development in the 20th century. The main cause for animals and plants disappearing is often a disruption to the food chain due to hunting, habitat loss or even the introduction of invasive (入侵的) species.

Every living thing from one-celled animals to a blue whale needs to eat. Nature is connected and controlled by many fragile food chains. A food chain describes who eats whom in a habitat. When one of the links in a food chain is no longer present — for example, a species goes extinct — the food chain breaks and sometimes this can cause other animals to disappear and the whole system can become imbalanced or even collapsed.

Humans can have disastrous effects on food chains. When people first explored the world, they took animal and plant species from their home countries to the places they explored and settled in. They did not realise the results of introducing invasive species. By doing so, they were disrupting the natural food chains of the areas they explored.

Nowadays there are strict rules controlling the movement of animals and plants between countries. But some parts of the world are still experiencing problems with invasive species introduced hundreds of years ago.

With rising awareness of how we affect the natural environment, hopefully we can learn to protect these food chains and help them to thrive. Otherwise the continued loss of species will eventually mean our own extinction.

9 . As humans encroach (侵入) more and more on wildlife habitats, animals are finding that the best way to survive isn’t to pack up and move — it’s to adapt to the night life. A variety of previously daytime animals such as foxes, deer and boars have become active at night to avoid human activity out of fear. But this nighttime switch comes with its own risks.

Researchers looked at how 62 species of animals on six continents changed their behavior in response to human activities such as hunting, farming, and development. The studies employed various technologies to follow the animals, from GPS trackers to motion-activated cameras.

Once night falls, the animals surveyed became far more active than they were before humans arrived, hunting and looking for food in the dark. For example, animals that used to split their activity evenly between day and night typically increased their nighttime activity to 68%.

The team also found the animals responded similarly to these human encroachments, regardless of whether human activity directly affected them. So, a deer might become more active at night simply because it sees humans hiking nearby, not because it’s being hunted.

The researchers believe these nighttime behaviors not only allow humans and animals to coexist more peacefully, they may be able to give us hints as to how to plan conservation efforts accordingly, such as limiting human activity during times when a specific species is more active. But moving to the nightlife could also have downsides for these animals. A nighttime lifestyle can reduce an animal’s ability to hunt and find food successfully and can even affect its ability to find a mate. Switching to a nighttime lifestyle can affect natural patterns of life even if these animals are doing so to reduce their interaction with humans. So, just because animals are becoming more active at night doesn’t mean they’ve escaped the influence of humans.