full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Noah R. Bressman: The fish that walk on land
Unscramble the Blue Letters
This pond is the only home this fish has ever known. But lately, it’s gotten cowredd and food is scarce. lclkuiy, it has an option many don’t: as a walking catfish, it can dacne its way out of the wtaer and onto bigger and better things. However, it faces many challenges on its terrestrial journey: it’s now in danger of suffocating, drying up, suffering physical damage from rough terrain, and being hunted by land predators.
We think of fish as completely aqatuic animals. But the wnailkg catfish is just one of hundreds of fish secieps that are actually amphibious, mneaing that they possess adaptations that enable them to survive on land. Fish amphibiousness is a spectrum. At one end are species like the mosquitofish that’ll only move on land when forced. And at the other end are species like mdsepkrpius that nonchalantly hop around mudflats for days at a time. But why do fish make the exodus from water to land? And how do they cope with this dtasric transition?
Open Cloze
This pond is the only home this fish has ever known. But lately, it’s gotten _______ and food is scarce. _______, it has an option many don’t: as a walking catfish, it can _____ its way out of the _____ and onto bigger and better things. However, it faces many challenges on its terrestrial journey: it’s now in danger of suffocating, drying up, suffering physical damage from rough terrain, and being hunted by land predators.
We think of fish as completely _______ animals. But the _______ catfish is just one of hundreds of fish _______ that are actually amphibious, _______ that they possess adaptations that enable them to survive on land. Fish amphibiousness is a spectrum. At one end are species like the mosquitofish that’ll only move on land when forced. And at the other end are species like ___________ that nonchalantly hop around mudflats for days at a time. But why do fish make the exodus from water to land? And how do they cope with this _______ transition?
Solution
- dance
- luckily
- species
- meaning
- walking
- drastic
- mudskippers
- crowded
- water
- aquatic
Original Text
This pond is the only home this fish has ever known. But lately, it’s gotten crowded and food is scarce. Luckily, it has an option many don’t: as a walking catfish, it can dance its way out of the water and onto bigger and better things. However, it faces many challenges on its terrestrial journey: it’s now in danger of suffocating, drying up, suffering physical damage from rough terrain, and being hunted by land predators.
We think of fish as completely aquatic animals. But the walking catfish is just one of hundreds of fish species that are actually amphibious, meaning that they possess adaptations that enable them to survive on land. Fish amphibiousness is a spectrum. At one end are species like the mosquitofish that’ll only move on land when forced. And at the other end are species like mudskippers that nonchalantly hop around mudflats for days at a time. But why do fish make the exodus from water to land? And how do they cope with this drastic transition?
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
| collocation |
frequency |
| amphibious fishes |
3 |
| walking catfish |
2 |
| find water |
2 |
| taste buds |
2 |
Important Words
- adaptations
- amphibious
- amphibiousness
- animals
- aquatic
- bigger
- catfish
- challenges
- completely
- cope
- crowded
- damage
- dance
- danger
- days
- drastic
- drying
- enable
- exodus
- faces
- fish
- food
- forced
- home
- hop
- hundreds
- hunted
- land
- luckily
- meaning
- mosquitofish
- move
- mudflats
- mudskippers
- nonchalantly
- option
- physical
- pond
- possess
- predators
- rough
- scarce
- species
- spectrum
- suffering
- suffocating
- survive
- terrain
- terrestrial
- time
- transition
- walking
- water