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（A）
BOISE， Idaho—Among traditional houses on Boise Avenue， Mark Lung， a former ecology professor，is working hard at bales[大捆] of straw [稻草] and mixing mud.
He is building a new home using local， recycled agricultural waste to build walls. The mud， sand， straw and water will be used both inside and outside of the house instead of bricks and paint.
“Similar in appearance to Southwestern adobes， straw bale structures are earth-friendly and energy-efficient，”Lung said.
Unlike the wall in a typical home， which is about 6 inches thick， a straw-bale wall is 18 to 23 inches thick， providing greater protection for the house against winter cold， summer heat and sound. Fire and pests are not a problem， either.
“Straw makes sense. It might be the building material of the future，”Lung said. “It is a cheap and easily renewable[可再生的]building material.”
Lung lived in a straw-bale house in Gunnison， Colo.， before moving to Boise. While there， he carefully set down the temperatures over a period of time. The outside temperature changed from 20 to 80 degrees. Inside， the temperature stayed between 68 and 72—there is no need to use heating or cooling equipment.
The cost of building a straw-bale home is lower than a traditional home. The materials—straw， sand and clay—are cheaper.
To build his home， Lung bought 250 bales at $2 a bale from a Meridian farmer. Lung is providing much of the labor himself and is using recycled materials， which brought the costs down to about $86 a square foot—he’s spending about $165，000， not including land.
Building the 1，900-square-foot home with traditional materials would have cost Lung about $103 per square foot.
Lung is sharing his building experience with other builders， experts and students. He said that almost every day， curious visitors “come and ask about the house.” Lung gives them a tour and explains what he is building and why.
“However， straw-bale homes still haven’t caught on with the mainstream， maybe because city codes have not been updated to allow them， he said.
1. The advantage of Mark Lung’s home is that ________.
A. it has thin walls to save space
B. it can keep much fresh air in the house
C. it benefits the earth and costs less money
D. it is able to change temperatures more easily
2. Mark Lung set down the temperatures to show that ________.
A. his houses saves energy
B. his house is of great value
C. he is an expert in building houses
D. he is interested in climate change
3. What do we know about Mark Lung from the passage？
A. He builds his house all by himself.
B. He thinks highly of straw as a building material.
C. He hasn’t lived in a straw-bale house before yet.
D. He studied Southwestern adobes to build his house.
4.It can be learned from the last two paragraphs that ________.
A. Lung’s idea has been widely accepted
B. Lung builds the straw-bale house for saving money.
C. it is impossible to build a straw-bale house in the city
D. many people show a great interest in Lung’s house exhibition
5. What’s the purpose of the passage？
A. To introduce the newly-built house.
B. To advocate this new kind of house.
C. To tell the benefits of the new house.
D. To share the building experience of Lung with others.
（B）
Until March 28， the fate of the gray wolf in the Rocky Mountains was in the hands of the federal government because the wolf was listed as an endangered species.But once it was removed from the list—a decision that is being challenged in court by a dozen conservation groups—the gray wolf fell under the protection of individual states. That is turning out to mean almost no protection at all.
Idaho’s， Fish and Game department announced last week that it would allow 428 of the state’s estimated 1000 wolves to die this year.Some will die of natural causes.Most will be killed by hunters.
Idaho officials argue that the remaining population will still be larger than the very small number to he protected in the original federal wolf recovery plans. But Idaho’s Fish and Game department has overruled its own staff biologists， who for the good of the wolf population and the ecosystem[生態係統] as a whole argued that more animals should be allowed to survive.
Sadly， in Idaho， wolves are nothing more than another game animal to be managed for the benefit of human hunters.
Beginning on Sept.15， any Idaho hunter with a hunting license and $10.50 for a wolf tag will be entitled to shoot one wolf， at least until the quota[限額] of dead wolves in his region has been reached. And how will a hunter know if the local quota has been reached？ There will be a hot line， of course.
Hunters will be encouraged not to shoot wolves wearing radio collar， because those wolvesare still being studied. Perhaps the solution is to fit all wolves with radio collars.
It is still possible that Idaho’s wolves—and the wolves in other stateswill get a reprieve. A federal judge will soon decide whether to support or object to the government’s decision to delist the gray wolf. We hope he will restore the wolf to the endangered species list. There is no better proof of how dangerous life is for wolves than Idaho’s plan to protect them.
1. From the first paragraph， we can know that ________.
A. the gray wolf was listed as an endangered species until March 28