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IELTS Reading Passage: Controlling deathwatch beetles
Controlling deathwatch beetles
1. All of the organisms that affect woods in edifices are part of the natural action that takes debris to the forest floor, disintegrates it into humus and recycles the nutrients released back into trees. Each phase in this action needs the correct habitat and if we copy then our edifices then the organisms that are into that part of the cycle will occupy. A poorly maintained roof is, after all, just an add-on of the forest floor to a fungus.
2. The first fact to recall about the debris beetles in your edifices is that they have probably been there for centuries and will continue long after you have gone. Beetle effect in Oak logs is a slow action and if we make it slower by good maintenance then the beetle population may finally decline to vanish. The fact is that natural looting will help you. Spiders are a notable vampire and will help to keep the beetle population under control. They will speed up the reduction of a beetle population in well-preserved edifices.
3. The beetles fly to light and some form of the light trap may help to exhaust a population. The place in which it is used must be dark so that there is no competing light origin, and the air temperature must increase above about 17oC during the disclosure season (April to June) so that the beetles will fly. Beetle pit do not vanish when the beetles have gone so it is sometimes important to verify active affliction if remedial works are planned.
4. This is normally easy with beetle effect in sapwood because the pits will look clean and have sharp edges, generally with bore dust dripping from them. Affliction deep within altered heartwood is more tough to find, especially because the beetle will not importantly bite their own crisis pits if many of other pits are available. These issues may be controlled by choking the guessed pits with furniture polish or by covering a group of pits tightly with paper or card. Any crisis beetles will make a pit that should be visible so that the size and immensity of the issue can be evaluated. Needless toxicant cure must be avoided.
5. Sometimes an edifice cannot be scorched enough to get rid of the beetles or a limited population will have built up unseen. A few disperse beetles in an edifice need not cause much concern, but droves of beetles below a beam-end might specify the requirement for some form of treatment if the overrun wood is attainable. Herbicide formulated as a paste can be successful-either applied to the surface or sealed into pre-drilled pits- but the expression may only be available by a corrective company.
6. Surface spray treatments are normally unsuccessful because they hardly pierce the surface of the wood and the beetles’ natural behavior does not bring it is not much contact with the pesticide. Contact pesticides might also kill natural vampires.
7. Heat treatments for whole edifices are obtainable and the global experience is that they are successful. They are also likely to be costly but they may be the only way to get rid of a heavy and widespread affiliation without causing sizable structural humiliation of the edifice.
Two other beetles are worth a mention.
8. The first is the house Longhorn Beetle (Hylotrupes bajulus). This is a large insect that makes oval crisis pits that are packed with refuse cylindrical beads. The beetles confine their activities to the sapwood of 20th-century softwood, although there is now some proof that they will attack older softwood. The beetle nymphs can cause sizeable effect but affiliation had normally been limited to the southwest of London, feasible because they need a high temperature before the beetles will fly. Old effect is, however, often found hence, thus designating a wider distribution in the past, and overrun wood is sometimes brought in. This is an insect that might become more general because of climate swap.
9. The second is the Lyctus or powderpost beetle. There are some types that are taher tough to tell apart. These beetles live in the sapwood of Oak. the beetles procreate quickly so that many cylindrical beetles may be present and the round crisis pit relate those of the furniture beetle. This is and has always been , a nuisance of newly-installed oak. Woods with a detonated sapwood surface are often found in old edifices and the effect will have happened during the first few decades after the woods were installed.
10. Our main attentiveness with these beetles is that they look to have become more general of late. Beetle affiliation within a few months of a new Oak construction will be Lyctus beetles in the sapwood and not furniture beetles. The issues can be avoided by using Oak with minimum sapwood content. The beetle affiliation will desist after a few years but spray treatment may be important if an affiliation is heavy.
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IELTS Reading Questions: Controlling Deathwatch Beetles
Question 1-4
Complete each sentence with the correct ending A-H below. Write the correct letter A-H in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
1. One species of the beetle population may spread_________
2. You can detect the presence of beetles________
3. You may kill household spiders_________
4. Beetles will disappear at a faster rate________
A. If the building is kept in good condition.
B. If you clog the suspected holes with furniture polish, paper or card
C. If the temperature rises to above about 17 degree celsius during the emergence season.
D. If you use contact insecticide.
E. If it was installed a few decades earlier
F. If changes in weather patterns continue
G. If the use of surface treatments is avoidedH. If the wood has a low sapwood concentration.
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Questions 5-9
Do the following statements agree with the information given in reading passage 1? In boxes 5-9 on your answer sheet, write
True if the statement agrees with the writer’s claims
False if the statement contradicts the writer’s claims
Not given impossible to say what the writer thinks about this
5. Infestation by beetles deep within modified heartwood can be identified by the type of hole visible.
6. Clogging a hole with furniture polish or paper will trap the beetle inside permanently.
7. Paste insecticides are less effective than any other kind.
8. Surface spray treatments are sometimes effective for the House Longhorn Beetle.
9. Heat treatment tends to cause less damage than other treatments.
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Questions 10-13
Choose the correct letter A, B,C or D.
10. The point the writer makes about deathwatch beetles is that
A. They must be eliminated quickly
B. Only natural redaction will keep them under control
C. With good maintenance it may be possible to eliminate them.
D. They are here to stay and do great damage.
11. One way to trap deathwatch beetles is to attract them to.
A. Daylight.
B. A totally dark environment
C. A constantly warm environment
D. A light trap in a dark place
12. Surface spray treatments are not effective because
A. The beetles are immune to them.
B. They do not reach the beetles
C. They react poorly to wooden surfaces
D. They attract other harmful creatures.
13. Damage by the House Longhorn Beetle is sometimes found further afield than London because
A. Temperatures have increased
B. The timber was not local timber
C. There was no effective treatment previously
D. The type of timber has changed
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Renewable Energy IELTS Reading Question with Answer
Controlling deathwatch beetles Reading Answers
1. Answer: F
2. Answer: B
3. Answer: D
4. Answer: A
5. Answer: False
6. Answer: False
7. Answer: False
8. Answer: Not given
9. Answer: True
10. Answer: C
11. Answer: D
12. Answer: B
13. Answer: B
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