2024年4月3日发(作者：)

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　　The Geographical Distribution of Gliding Animals

　　1 Southeast Asia has a unique abundance and diversity of gliding animals,flying

squirrels,flying frogs,and flying lizards with wings of skin that enable them to glide

through the tropical could be the explanation for the great diversity

in this region and the scarcity of such animals in other tropical forests?Gliding

has generally been viewed as either a means of escaping predators,by allowing animals

to move between trees without descending to the ground,or as an energetically

efficient way of traveling long distances between scattered what is

special about Southeast Asian rain forests?

　　2 Scientists have proposed various theories to explain the diversity of gliding

animals in Southeast first theory might be called the tall-trees

forests of Southeast Asia are taller than forests elsewhere due to

the domination of the dipterocarp family:a family of tall,tropical hardwood

trees could allow for longer glides and the opportunity to build up speed

in a dive before lower wind speeds in tall-tree forests might also

contribute by providing a more advantageous situation for gliding between

argument has several flaws,,gliding animals are found throughout the

Southeast Asian region,even in relatively short-stature forests found in the northern

range of the rain forest in China,Vietnam,and gliders also thrive in

low secondary forests,plantations,and even city y,gliding animals do not

require tall trees for their addition,many gliding animals begin their

glides from the middle of tree trunks,not even ascending to the tops of trees to take

off.

　　3 A second theory,which we might call the broken-forest hypothesis,speculates

that the top layer of the forest—the tree canopy has fewer woody vines connecting

tree crowns in Southeast Asian forests than in New World and African a

result,animals must risk descending to the ground or glide to move between

addition,the tree canopy is presumed to be more uneven in height in Asian forests,due

to the presence of the tall dipterocarp trees with lower trees between them,again

favoring gliding ecologists who work in different regions of the world

observe tremendous local variation in tree height,canopy structure,and abundance of

vines,depending on the site conditions of soil,climate,slope elevation,and local

can find many locations in Southeast Asia where there are abundant

woody vines and numerous connections between trees and similarly many Amazonian

forests with few woody vines.

　　4 A final theory differs from the others in suggesting that it is the presence

of dipterocarp trees themselves that is driving the evolution of gliding species.■

(A)According to this view,dipterocarp forests can be food-deserts for the animals

that live in them.■(B)The animals living in dipterocarp forests that have evolved

gliding consist of two main feeding groups:leaf eaters and carnivores that eat small

prey such as insects and small vertebrates.■(C)For leaf-eating gliders the problem

is not the absence of any leaves but the desert-like absence of edible

ocarp trees often account for 50 percent or more of the total number

of canopy trees in a forest and over 95 percent of the large trees,yet dipterocarp

leaves are unavailable to most vertebrate plant eaters because of the high

concentration of toxic chemicals in their leaves.■(D)Many species of gliding animals

avoid eating dipterocarp leaves and so must travel widely through the

forest,bypassing the dipterocarp trees,to find the leaves they need to

gliding is a more efficient manner of traveling between trees than descending to the

ground and walking or else jumping between trees.

　　5 Many carnivorous animals also may need to search more widely for food due to

the lower abundance of insects and other is caused by dipterocarps’

irregular flowering and fruiting cycles of two-to seven-year intervals,causing a

scarcity of the flowers,fruits,seeds,and seedlings that are the starting point of

so many food lower abundance of prey in dipterocarp forests forces animals

such as lizards and geckos to move between tree crowns in search of food,with gliding

being the most efficient means.

　　托福阅读TPO38Part3题目

　　(第1段)ing to paragraph 1,what question about gliding species are

researchers trying to answer?

　　A)Why it took millions of years for gliding animals to evolve in the tropical

forests of Southeast Asia

　　B)Why gliding animals,though rare in most tropical forests,have evolved in so

many different families in Southeast Asia

　　C)Why gliding animals evolved in many tropical forests in Southeast Asia before

they evolved in any of the tropical forests elsewhere in the world

　　D)Why gliding animals evolved only in tropical rain forests

　　(第1段)ing to paragraph 1,it is generally thought that the ability to

glide is useful to forest-dwelling species because gliding

　　A)allows them to adapt to a wide variety of forest conditions

　　B)eliminates the need to travel long distances in search of food