Read the following passage.
A. The North American river otter is a semi-aquatic mammal found across most of Canada and the United States. It can live anywhere with a steady food supply and easy access to water, including rivers, lakes, marshes, swamps and estuaries. Its body is long and streamlined, with short legs and a thick, tapered tail, and it can close its nostrils underwater. Dense, soft fur keeps it warm in cold water. River otters are sensitive to pollution and tend to disappear from areas where the water is polluted. They were wiped out in parts of their range, but reintroduction and conservation work have helped their numbers stabilize.
B. Otters hunt mainly in the water, taking fish, frogs and other amphibians, turtles, crayfish and crabs. They usually catch slow fish such as suckers rather than fast game fish. Long, sensitive whiskers help them find prey in dark water, where smell, sight and hearing are weaker. A river otter can stay underwater for up to eight minutes. It normally eats small prey right away in the water and carries larger catches to land. Because its metabolism runs very high, an otter has to eat a great deal every day.
C. Otter dens are usually dug into the bank of a stream, but otters also move into burrows left by other mammals, hollows under logs and old beaver lodges. A den has an underwater entrance and a tunnel that leads to a nest chamber lined with leaves, grass, moss, bark and hair. There a female gives birth to between one and six young, most often two or three. The pups open their eyes at about one month, come out of the den at about two months and are weaned at about three months. The young can swim by instinct, but their mother has to coax them into the water the first time.
D. Otters are known for play, and watchers may see them sliding down riverbanks, burrowing through snow or playing in the water. This play seems to strengthen social bonds and to help young otters practise hunting. Otters normally hunt at night, yet they can be spotted at any time of day, and one that meets a person face to face may stand its ground rather than run. On Prince Edward Island, river otters are being spotted again nearly 100 years after they disappeared. The provincial wildlife biologist there asks anyone who sees one to report the sighting.
E. Not given in any of the above paragraphs.
Decide which paragraph, A to D, has the information given in each statement below. Select E if the information is not given in any of the paragraphs.
AI explanationShows the answer. Tap to open.
Correct Answer: B
Why this is correct: Paragraph B says a river otter can stay underwater for up to eight minutes. Staying underwater that long means holding its breath for several minutes.
Passage Reference: A river otter can stay underwater for up to eight minutes.
Tips: The first paragraph also mentions being underwater. Look for the paragraph that gives a length of time.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Look at paragraph A: it says an otter can close its nostrils underwater. But it gives no time for how long it can stay down.
- C: Paragraph C is about dens with underwater entrances and pups learning to swim, not how long an adult can dive.
- D: Paragraph D describes play and what watchers may see. It does not measure time spent underwater.
- E: The figure of up to eight minutes underwater appears in Paragraph B, the paragraph about hunting.
Correct Answer: C
Passage Reference: Otter dens are usually dug into the bank of a stream, but otters also move into burrows left by other mammals, hollows under logs and old beaver lodges.
Why this is correct: Paragraph C says otters move into burrows left by other mammals and into old beaver lodges. It also says the female gives birth in the den, so these borrowed homes are where young are raised.
Tips: Find where the writer describes the homes where otters raise their young. Then check who made some of those homes first.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Paragraph A lists the kinds of water otters live near, such as lakes and marshes, but not the dens they use.
- B: Paragraph B is about food and hunting, so homes and burrows do not come up.
- D: Watchers in Paragraph D see otters sliding and playing, but nothing is said about where otters sleep or give birth.
- E: Burrows left by other mammals and old beaver lodges are named in Paragraph C as places otters use for dens.
Correct Answer: D
Passage Reference: Otters normally hunt at night, yet they can be spotted at any time of day, and one that meets a person face to face may stand its ground rather than run.
Why this is correct: Paragraph D says otters normally hunt at night, yet they can be spotted at any time of day. So a watcher may see one at any hour, even though most hunting happens after dark.
Tips: Notice that paragraph B is all about hunting, yet the time of day appears only in the paragraph about watching otters.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Paragraph A explains where otters live and how their bodies work, but it says nothing about day or night.
- B: Paragraph B explains what and how otters hunt, but it does not say at what time of day they do it.
- C: The third paragraph follows the life of pups in the den and gives ages in months, not hours of the day.
- E: The times when otters hunt and when they can be seen are both given in Paragraph D.
Correct Answer: B
Passage Reference: Because its metabolism runs very high, an otter has to eat a great deal every day.
Why this is correct: Paragraph B says an otter's metabolism runs very high, so it has to eat a great deal every day. A high metabolism means the body uses energy fast.
Tips: The statement gives a reason with 'because'. Find where the otter's need for a lot of food is explained, and check that the reason is about its body.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: The first paragraph mentions a steady food supply as part of good habitat. But it does not explain why otters need so much food.
- C: The nest, the pups and weaning are covered in Paragraph C. The adult's energy needs are not.
- D: Look at paragraph D: it talks about play and hunting practice, not how much food an otter needs.
- E: The link between a high metabolism and eating a great deal is made in Paragraph B.
Correct Answer: A
Passage Reference: The North American river otter is a semi-aquatic mammal found across most of Canada and the United States.
Why this is correct: The North American river otter, paragraph A tells us, is found across most of Canada and the United States. So otters live in most parts of Canada.
Tips: In paragraph D, the writer names one island. Look instead for the sentence about the whole country.
Why the other options are wrong:
- B: The second paragraph describes prey such as fish, frogs and crabs, not where in the country otters are found.
- C: The third paragraph describes stream banks and beaver lodges as den sites, but it does not name any part of Canada.
- D: Look at paragraph D: it names one place, Prince Edward Island, where otters are returning. It does not describe their range across the country.
- E: Notice that paragraph A opens by saying the river otter is found throughout Canada.
Correct Answer: E
Passage Reference: This play seems to strengthen social bonds and to help young otters practise hunting.
Why this is correct: The fourth paragraph says otters slide down riverbanks as a kind of play. That play seems to strengthen social bonds and help young otters practise hunting. It never says sliding is a fast way to travel.
Tips: Look at paragraph D: it gives reasons for play. Check whether getting around quickly is one of them.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Notice that paragraph A describes the otter's body, with short legs and a tapered tail. It does not mention sliding or why otters do it.
- B: The second paragraph is about catching and eating prey, so sliding is not part of it.
- C: The third paragraph covers dens and the first swim of the pups. Sliding is not mentioned.
- D: Sliding is described in Paragraph D, so it looks right, but its reasons are social bonds and hunting practice, not speed.
Correct Answer: A
Passage Reference: River otters are sensitive to pollution and tend to disappear from areas where the water is polluted.
Why this is correct: Here the text in paragraph A is clear. River otters are sensitive to pollution and tend to disappear from areas where the water is polluted. Unclean water is polluted water.
Tips: The fourth paragraph also says otters disappeared from one place. Find the paragraph that links leaving with the water itself.
Why the other options are wrong:
- B: Notice that paragraph B mentions dark water, which makes hunting harder, but not dirty water that drives otters away.
- C: In Paragraph C, water matters only for dens and the pups' first swim. Its quality is not discussed.
- D: Notice that paragraph D says otters disappeared from Prince Edward Island, but it gives no reason connected to the water.
- E: Otters leaving areas with polluted water is explained in Paragraph A.
Correct Answer: D
Passage Reference: The provincial wildlife biologist there asks anyone who sees one to report the sighting.
Why this is correct: On Prince Edward Island, paragraph D explains, the provincial wildlife biologist asks anyone who sees an otter to report the sighting. A biologist is a scientist.
Tips: Look for the name Prince Edward Island and the word 'report'.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Look at paragraph A: it says reintroduction and conservation work helped otters, but it does not ask the public to do anything.
- B: Notice that paragraph B covers what otters eat and how long they stay underwater, not reports from the public.
- C: The third paragraph describes dens and pups. No request to people appears there.
- E: The request to report any otter sighting sits in the last sentence of Paragraph D.
Correct Answer: A
Passage Reference: Its body is long and streamlined, with short legs and a thick, tapered tail, and it can close its nostrils underwater.
Why this is correct: The otter can close its nostrils underwater, as the body description in paragraph A shows. The nostrils are the openings of the nose, so it can shut its nose below the surface.
Tips: Find the description of how the otter is built for life in water. Then check what it can do with its nose when it goes under.
Why the other options are wrong:
- B: The second paragraph says smell is weaker in the water and whiskers help instead. But it does not say the nose can close.
- C: The underwater entrance in Paragraph C belongs to the den, not to the otter's body.
- D: The fourth paragraph shows otters playing in water and snow. Their noses are not described.
- E: The otter's ability to close its nostrils underwater is part of the body description in Paragraph A.
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