A hollow (空洞) halfway up a tree might seem like a strange place to look for a water-loving animal, but the results of a new survey have showed that common toads (蟾蜍) in the U. K. are skillful tree climbers. The surprising discovery was made by researchers from the University of Cambridge, working with Froglife, a charity devoted to amphibians(animals such as frogs and toads that divide their time between being on land and in water).
The team looked at reports from volunteers who were studying special nest boxes as part of the National Dormouse (睡鼠) Monitoring Program and the Bat Tree habitat Key project. “We couldn’t believe what we found,” said Nida Alfulaij, a scientist who supported the work. “We’re used to discovering woodland birds and other small mammals in nest boxes, but we hadn’t considered finding amphibians in them.” More than 50 common toads were found in very unexpected places: in parts of trees that are usually used by bats, in nest boxes designed for dormice, and even in old birds’ nests. That’s such a surprisingly high number that the researchers think tree-climbing must be a common toad habit—it’s just never been noticed before.
The researchers say this shows how sharing data between surveys with different aims can lead to new discoveries—even about species that experts believe they know well. Through the discoveries the researchers also have a clear understanding of how important tree hollows, cracks and holes are to all sorts of animals. It’s still unclear how easy the toads find it to climb—they were spotted up to 3 meters high in trees but this was as far up as the volunteers were looking, so they could be going even higher.
Why do the kind of toads climb the trees? The researchers have some guesses, such as looking for food, hiding from hunters or avoiding pests such as the toad fly. It is still a puzzle.
【小题1】What do we know about the new study?| A．It relied on the early studies of the team. |
| B．It came as no surprise to the researchers. |
| C．It resulted from the data of other surveys. |
| D．It proves what experts have known before. |
| A．Trees are believed to be toads’ best place to live in. |
| B．They climb trees to keep bats and dormice company. |
| C．The proper number of toads living together is 50 or so. |
| D．The toads may have formed the habit of climbing before. |
| A．Other living habits. |
| B．The reasons for climbing. |
| C．The ways to avoid pests. |
| D．More examples of the finding. |
| A．A science journal about biology. |
| B．A paper about the habitats of birds. |
| C．A fiction about amphibians animals. |
| D．A course about the significance of trees. |
Have you wondered how dogs became man's best friends? On October 30, a study published in the online journal Science revealed more information about the history between dogs and humans, dating back thousands of years.
From previous studies, it was known that sometime between 15,000 to 40,000 years ago, humans first encountered a friendly gray wolf, and that forever changed the relationship. The dogs of today are descendants of and were domesticated from gray wolves.
Greger Larson from the University of Oxford, along with an international team, examined the genomes (genetic makeup) of 27 ancient dog species from remains dating back 800 to11,000 years ago. The team discovered that 11,000 years ago, there were five distinct species of dogs from Northern Europe, the Near East, Siberia, New Guinea, and the Americas. It turned out that today's dog species can trace their ancestry to one of these five ancient species. For example, the chihuahuas are descendants of ancient dogs from the Americas, while the huskies are descendants of the Siberian breed. The team also found that most of the modern European dog breeds come from two breeds - Northern Europe and the Near East. And finally, the five species trace their origin to one ancient species of wolf.
The scientists found remains of dog species in Europe are originally from the Near East. This led them to conclude that humans traveled with their dogs as they migrated from one area to another. These dogs were brought as companions or to act as guard dogs or hunting dogs.
Finally, with dogs and humans living together, the two also developed similar characteristics such as the ability to digest high-starch diets. When two species adapt to an environment in similar ways, it is known as “convergent evolution”.
As you can see, this study is already changing what we know about our favorite companion. We cannot wait to hear what else scientists unearth!
【小题1】Where did the huskies originate from?| A．Northern Europe. | B．The Near East. | C．Siberia. | D．New Guinea. |
| A．By tracing the ancestry. | B．By examining the genomes. |
| C．By observing the remains. | D．By referring to previous studies. |
| A．Humans traveled to Europe with their dogs' remains. |
| B．Dog species once migrated from Europe to the Near East. |
| C．Humans migrated from the Near East to Europe in history. |
| D．Humans only migrated with hunting dogs from area to area. |
| A．Five Distinct Species of Ancient Dogs. |
| B．Long Relationship Between Dogs and Humans. |
| C．Convergent Evolution of Dogs and Humans. |
| D．How Dogs Were Domesticated from Gray Wolves. |
The mind of an elephant should not be underestimated (低估). They are intelligent (聪明的) animals born with both excellent memory and artistic talent. Elephants eat about 495 pounds of vegetarian food a day. They spend about 16 hours a day eating, but must walk about 4 miles a day in search of food. The average (通常的) elephant lives about 70 years, and its sharp memory allows it to remember places where it has found food as long as 30 years earlier, even as a baby.
In an elephant’s travels, it comes across other elephants also looking for food. Some elephants are friendly, and some are not so nice. Elephants remember every elephant they have ever met. They can even recognize an elephant they perhaps haven’t seen for 30 years. They immediately remember whether this elephant is an enemy or a friend.
When elephants are not searching for food, they sometimes produce art in the sand with their trunks (象鼻). They seem to enjoy just relaxing and painting in the sand. One day, an elephant zookeeper noticed this and gave an elephant a paint brush filled with red paint to see if the elephant would paint on a canvas (画布). Sure enough, it did, and since then elephants in most zoos have been given paint brushes, paints, and canvases. The resulting abstract (抽象的)art has been sold for high prices around the world. The money goes to support feeding the elephants in the zoos. Most felt that the elephants were only capable of painting abstracts. However, they have been trained to paint trees, flowers, and other things in nature. This has enabled us to understand “elephant genius (天才)”even more.
【小题1】What can we learn about elephants’ memory?| A．It is at its best in the first 30 years. |
| B．It can reach as far back as 30 years. |
| C．It differs greatly among elephants. |
| D．It remains excellent for 70 years. |
| A．To attract visitors to it. |
| B．To train it to paint pictures. |
| C．To find out whether it could draw. |
| D．To prove it was a born artist. |
You need to dress warmly when you play in the snow.And to get around in deep snow，you might need snowshoes.
Animals need winter coats and snowshoes too.
A musk ox(麝牛) wears two coats in winter.
A snowshoe rabbit changes its coat to match the season.
The Arctic fox has fur on the bottoms of its feet and one of the warmest double coats of any animal.But on very cold and windy days，it adds something.
A polar bear’s big feet act like snowshoes.
| A．It can run very quickly. |
| B．Do you wear a sweater under your coat? |
| C．They can move quickly across the snow. |
| D．The outer coat reaches almost to the ground. |
| E．It uses its thick tail like a scarf to cover its nose and face. |
| F．In summer its brown fur helps it hide among dirt and rocks. |
| G．They spread out the bear’s weight so it can walk easily on the snow. |
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