# The history of the tortoise: answers and explanations

Cambridge IELTS 9, Test 1, Reading Passage 3

Source: Passage, questions and answer key from Cambridge IELTS 9, Test 1, Reading Passage 3. © Cambridge University Press & Assessment. Used for educational practice. Explanations and evidence notes are written by Testmigo.

## Answer key

| Q | Answer | Proof |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 27 | plants | without whose prior invasion of the land none of the other migrations could have happened. |
| 28 | breathing and reproduction | Moving from water to land involved a major redesign of every aspect of life, including breathing and reproduction. |
| 29 | gills | having never developed anything equivalent to the gills of their earlier marine incarnation. |
| 30 | dolphins | with fins and streamlined bodies. The fossils look like dolphins |
| 31 | NOT GIVEN | Turtles went back to the sea a very long time ago |
| 32 | FALSE | especially if only fragments are found. Sometimes it's obvious. |
| 33 | TRUE | The fossils look like dolphins, and they surely lived like dolphins, in the water. |
| 34 | 3 measurements | obtained three measurements in these particular bones of 71 species of living turtles and tortoises. |
| 35 | graph | They used a kind of triangular graph paper to plot the three measurements against one another. |
| 36 | cluster | All the land tortoise species formed a tight cluster of points in the upper part of the triangle |
| 37 | amphibious | except when they added some species that spend time both in water and on land ... Sure enough, these amphibious species show up |
| 38 | half way | approximately half way between the 'wet cluster' of sea tortoises |
| 39 | dry-land tortoises | Their points on the graph are right in the thick of the dry cluster. ... Both these fossils were dry-land tortoises. |
| 40 | D | Tortoises therefore represent a remarkable double return. |

## Why these answers are right

**27. plants.** The question asks what had to move onto land before any animals could. Paragraph A says that without the plants' prior invasion of the land, none of the other migrations could have happened, so plants is the answer.

**28. breathing and reproduction.** Big changes matches a major redesign in paragraph B, which says that moving from water to land reshaped every aspect of life, including breathing and reproduction. Both processes are needed, joined by and, in either order.

**29. gills.** Paragraph B says whales still breathe air because they never developed anything equivalent to the gills of their earlier marine incarnation. Their sea-dwelling ancestors had gills and modern whales do not, so gills is the feature whales lack.

The why and the trap for questions 30 onwards are free with an account on the [answers page](https://testmigo.com/ielts/reading/the-history-of-the-tortoise/answers).

[Practice The history of the tortoise](https://testmigo.com/ielts/reading/the-history-of-the-tortoise)