1.    Choose the correct option.

Scientists have come up with a new theory on why woolly mammoths became (1) _______ 21,000 years ago. Up until now, people have believed that mammoths, the 3-meter-high relatives of elephants, died out because they were hunted to extinction. New research shows they ran out of grass, and that was caused by global (2) ________ 21 millennia ago. Researchers from the UK’s Durham University suggest the hairy dinosaurs (3) __________ to death because forests took the grasslands they needed to (4) ___________. As the Earth became warmer and wetter, forests spread and the mammoth had fewer areas to graze. “Mammoths had roamed and munched their way across many parts of Europe,” said lead professor Brain Huntley.

Professor Huntley said what happened to the mammoths in prehistoric times is a warning of what might happen in the future to today’s large herbivores. “This was a time of major environmental (5) ___________ and loses of (6) ___________ that may have led to the extinction of mega-species that roamed many parts of the planet,” he said. He had a warning about the plight of today’s large animals: “It is food for thought in these times of global warming and (7) ___________ habitat change”. Other creatures also to become extinct due to climate change were the cave lion, giant deer, wooly rhino and the cave bear. The research team believe today’s elephants and rhinoceroses could suffer a similar fate.

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