2014年8月30日托福阅读真题P3+题目+答案：How Herding Can Provide Safety

2014年8月30日托福阅读真题P3+题目+答案：How Herding Can Provide Safety

In open grasslands there is no place for a large animal to hide. Thus a watchful grazing animal will see the slight movement that betrays the presence of a predator long before it is close enough to launch an attack. It sounds as though the hunters (predators) stand no chance at all. Unfortunately for the grazers, life is not so simple, however. A grazing animal must lower its head and look at the ground to feed. Its attention may be occupied for only a few seconds before it raises its head and resumes its watch while chewing the food it took, but hunters are patient and skillful and are concentrating intensely. Those few seconds provide time enough to advance a few steps and then freeze, body flattened against the ground. It may take hours, but eventually these repeated small advances will put the hunter within range—close enough to outrun its prey—and the long time the hunt has taken will have been worthwhile, because the resulting feast will be highly nutritious.

43. The word "slight" in the passage is closest in meaning to

A.hidden

B.slow

C.distant

D.small

44. According to paragraph 1, which of the following presents a serious difficulty for the predators that hunt animals grazing in grasslands?

A.It is difficult to find grazers in grasslands when they are feeding with their heads down.

B.Predators lack places to hide from prey in grasslands.

C.It is difficult for predators to outrun grazers on grasslands.

D.Grazers in open grasslands tend to be very large animals.

45. Which of the following can be inferred from paragraph 1 about grazing animals?

A.They spend significantly more time looking down at the ground than they do with their heads raised.

B.They tend to remain within a relatively small area for extended periods of time.

C.They are extremely difficult for predators to see as long as they remain motionless.

D.They can run significantly faster than most of their predators.

46. Which of the following can be inferred from paragraph 1 about grazing animals?

A.They spend significantly more time looking down at the ground than they do with their heads raised.

B.They tend to remain within a relatively small area for extended periods of time.

C.They are extremely difficult for predators to see as long as they remain motionless.

D.They can run significantly faster than most of their predators.

Clearly the grazers are at a disadvantage, because while they eat they are vulnerable to attack. The hunters also have a weakness, however, and it is one that allows the grazers to survive. Hunters can attack only one prey animal at a time. This applies even to the predators that hunt as a team, such as lionesses, wolves, and hunting dogs. Their hunt involves running down or ambushing an individual. Teamwork allows them to hunt animals much bigger and stronger than themselves and to hunt more successfully, but it does not allow them to attack more than one individual at a time.

47. According to paragraph 2, what is an advantage to predators that hunt as a team?

A.A team can kill animals that are much bigger and stronger than any of the predators could take on by itself.

B.A team can ambush their prey without having to run them down as an individual predator has to do.

C.A team can attack more prey animals at one time than an individual predator could.

D.A team is less vulnerable to an aggressive response from grazers.

48. In paragraph 2, why does the author describe the hunting technique used by predators that hunt as a team?

A.To explain why predators that hunt as a team wait until grazers start eating to attack

B.To argue that species that hunt as a team do not have the same weakness as individual predators

C.To emphasize that even predators that hunt in groups cannot hunt and attack more than one prey at a time

D.To help explain why grazers are at a particular disadvantage with certain predatory animals

The grazers exploit this weakness by making it as difficult as they can for the predators to choose an individual as a target. They do not graze alone, scattered widely across the landscape, but together, as a herd. The approaching hunter sees not a solitary animal, but a crowd of animals, all of them moving, so they are constantly crossing and recrossing each other’s paths. No sooner does the hunter choose an individual than another animal has crossed in front of it and the target has disappeared into the herd. From the hunter’s point of view this is highly confusing behavior—as, indeed, it is meant to be.

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