Alpacas (8.1)
Alpacas were firstkeptby the Inca
people in the mountains of South
America, more than six thousand years
ago. These animal provided clothes, food
and fuel for their owners. The softest
wool wasmainlyworn by the leaders of
Incan society though.
When Spanish explorersarrivedin the
fifteenth century, sheep were introduced
and these graduallyreplacedalpacas in
the region. It wasn'tuntilthe middle of
the 20th century that both farmers and
fashion designers began to recognise
thequalitiesof alpacas again. They are
easy to lookaftersince they eat grass and
are used to low temperatures. Their wool,
which comes in arangeof natural colours
from white to dark brown, is lighter and
warmer than sheep's wool andalsostrong.
It is not surprisingthereforethat
alpacas are becoming a familiar sight in
the fields of North America, Australia and
the UK.
Horses (8.2)
Horses have beenvaluabeto humans
for thousands of years. Because there are
several differentsorts of horses such as
coldbloods, which are large but gentle, or
hotbloods that areknownfor their
running ability, there are horses for every
purpose. We use them for transport
aswellas for physical work, for
examplepullingfarm machinery. It's now
also verycommonto see horses used in
sports.
Horses need food and water in
largeamounts. A horse can
drinkbetweentwenty and forty litres of
water a day, and around a kilo of food
foreveryfifty kilos od its body weight.
Horses need to be out in the fields, as
grass is part of their diet.
They can live forover25 years, so their
owners need to give themplentyof love
and attention- but horses always give lots
back.
Wool (8.3)
Wool comes from sheep
andcertainother animals like goats and
rabbits. Over a million tonnes of wool is
produced every year, ofwhich60% goes
into clothes. The wool that is
usedmostly comes from Australian
Merino sheep. Their wool is good for
baby clothes, as it is soft,keepsbabies
warm, and canprotecttheir bodies.
When wool is first cut from the sheep,
itcontainsa high level of a valuable oil,
so before the wool is used, it must be
cleaned. Thesimplestway to do this is by
putting the wool in warm water. The oil
that isremoved from the wool is widely
used in Products like hand creams.
Sheep were first used by humans
several thousand years ago,butit is
believed that this was for
meatratherthan wool. When people
developed a way of cutting the wool from
sheep itbacamea more important
material.
Finding Gold (8.4)
Most people wouldagreethat finding
the perfect ring for your partner is
difficult. However, John Greenwood, a
Scottish engineer,gavehimself an extra
challenge.Instead of taking a trip to the
jeweller's. Johnspent much of last year
standing up to his knees in freezing water.
He was looking for tiny pieces of
goldamong the stones on the river beds
in the Scottish Highlands.
Using verybasic equipment, John
worked hard tocollect enough gold to
make not just an engagement ring for his
girlfriend, Morag,but also their two
wedding rings. 'I was out
thereevery weekend and in the evenings
before it got dark, in freezing cold water,'
he said.
Experts think that John was amazingly
lucky to find so much gold in such
ashort time. Many peoplesearch for 30
years without getting anything.
ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL
(7.1)
Alexander Graham Bell …. born in
Scotland in 1847. His father, an expert on
speech, developed a way of teaching how
words should be pronounced. He
translated the sounds of words into
straight or curvy lines.
Alexander trained to be a teacher and,
when his mother went deaf, he started to
be interested in how deaf people
communicate. In 1870, because his
children were in poor health, Alexander
and his family moved to be United States.
He hoped that a warmer climate would be
better for the whole family.
It was while he was teaching deaf
children there that he invented a new
machine. It was very similar to human
ear itself, and Bell discovered it could
carry human speech along a wire frome
one place to another. It was not long
before the telephone was a part of all our
lives!
The Art Of Drawing (7.2)
Drawing has always been a very
popular hobby. Young children draw with
a pencil as soon as they can hold one.
Drawing is often seen as a special skill,
and it is true that some people seem to
draw perfect picture without any effort.
Yet drawing, like writing, can be learnt;
you can draw accurately if you work
really hard at it.
Drawing is first of all about looking
carefully. It sounds easy to say thay all
you need to do is look it things, but it
really is that simple. The best way to draw
a familiar subject is to imagine that you
are looking at it for the first time.
Nowadays there are more courses and
materials available than ever before,
which means that you can experiment to
improve your skills. The only limit is
your imagination.
Cave Painting in Australia (7.3)
A cave containing over 200 paintings
was discovered in the Wollemi National
Park, Australia, eight years ago. Some of
the paintings are at the least 3000 years
old. What is even more surprising is that
the cave was found by chance by
someone walking in the area. However,
the site of cave was so difficult to reach
that it took a long time before researchers
could visit it.
The exact location of the site has to be
kept secret. This is to prevent the cave
from being visited by sightseers who do
not realise how easy it is to damage the
paintings.
The paintings show people and animals,
including birds, lizards and other
Australia animals that can still be seen
today.
According to researchers, untill its
recent discovery, nobody has visited the
cave for around 200 years.
The Driest Place on Earth (7.4)
The Atacama Desert in Chile is... as the
driest place on Earth. It is almost 1,000
kilometres in length, lying between the
Pacific Ocean and the Andes mountains.
Under a centimeter of rain falls annually,
and the centre is so dry that scientists
have never recorded any rain there.
Overamillion peopleactuallylivein
the.Atacama today.Most liveon
thecoast, which is also home to teams of
astronomers whoarethere to those
advantage of the clear skies. In the north,
farmers grow tomatoes with have their
farms on higher ground, the water comes
from melting snow.
People generally seem to lack
knowledge about what the desert has to
offer, but in fact, there is plenty to do –
from seeing the amazing natural sights to
playing golf, one of the more recent
activities attracting tourists to the region.
