The Most Extreme Animals（在线收听）

The Most Extreme Animals

Earth is a planet of extremes, extreme places and extreme animals, but some animals are more extreme than others. Join us as we count down to find the most unusual and the most extraordinary on “The Most Extreme”!

The Fastest Runner: The Tiger Beetle

You can find the most extreme 1)speedster almost anywhere on earth. It may be the fastest thing on six legs. The tiger beetle is a pocket rocket, the fastest insect on earth, and probably one of the most 2)ferocious.

So just how fast is a tiger beetle? If you put a tiger beetle on a racetrack it would 3)sprint at the same speed as a human out for a 4)brisk walk. Now, eight kilometers per hour doesn’t sound very extreme, but imagine if it was the same size as a human — it would take only half a second to win the 100 metre sprint! To catch a beetle moving at over 480 kilometres per hour, we’d need a 5)drag racer!

But there’s a problem with being the fastest sprinter on the planet. Tiger beetles run so fast they go blind. Those enormous eyes work well when the beetle sits still but once the beetle starts running, its eyes can’t process information fast enough to see its surroundings. The tiger beetle is the number one most extreme sprinter on the planet— because it’s literally running blind.

Blood Thirsty Biter: The Shark

The most extreme biting animal in the countdown lives in the sea, but it’s not what you expect. But when it comes to biting, what could be better than Jaws. Surely nothing could compete with the great white shark? The great white shark is a blood thirsty biter that could easily be number one in the countdown.

The average human bite strength is only about 21 kilograms per square centimeter. Compare that to a shark — their jaws are estimated to 6)generate forces 100 times more powerful. We’d go through a few teeth as well if our bite strength topped the scales at 2,800 kilograms per square centimeter.

It’s number one because for its size, the Cookie-cutter has the largest teeth of any shark in the sea. Scientists know that the Cookie-cutter, one of the smallest sharks in the world, hunts the biggest animals on the planet. Whales, not 7)nuclear submarines, are the normal diet of the Cookie-cutter shark and that’s what makes this biter number one in the countdown.

King of 8)Fertility:The 9)Tapeworm

This 10)parasite produces more 11)offspring than any other creature on earth. If you could give birth like a tapeworm, your children would fill the city of New York in two weeks. You’d be giving birth to a million babies a day!

Tapeworms are extreme breeders, because they have more sexual organs than any other animal. Their body is a long chain of more than 2,000 identical 12)segments and each segment is almost entirely devoted to producing eggs. That’s because the tapeworm’s life cycle means that an egg has to be swallowed by another animal and if we eat meat that’s infected by a tapeworm we get it too.

It’s a scary thought that 13)lurking in your lower 14)intestine could be one of 350 different species of human tapeworm! Although you may not like being the host of a parasite, you can’t help but admire the tapeworm’s incredible fertility. 

注释：
1) speedster [5spi:dstE] n. 高速行进的人，高速汽车，超速驾驶者
2) ferocious [fE5rEuFEs] a. 凶恶的，残忍的，凶猛的
3) sprint [sprint] v. 疾跑
4) brisk walk 快速步行
5) drag racer 短程高速的赛车
6) generate [5dVenE7reit] v. 产生，发生
7) nuclear submarines 核潜艇
8) fertility [fE:5tiliti] n. 丰产，多产，生产力
9) tapeworm [5teipwE:m] n. [动]绦虫
10) parasite [5pArEsait] n. 寄生虫
11) offspring [5CfspriN] n. （单复数同形）儿女，子孙，后代，产物
12) segment [5se^mEnt] n. 段，节，片断
13) lurk [lE:k] v. 潜伏
14) intestine [in5testin] n. [解，动]肠

最不可思议的动物

地球是一个充满极端的星球: 极端的地方和极端的动物。但是有些动物比其它任何东西都要极端。加入我们的行列，在“动物之最”节目里数一数最非同一般的、最与众不同的动物。

极速狂奔：甲虎虫

几乎在地球上的任何一个角落，你都能找到这最神速的动物，它可能是跑得最快的六腿动物。甲虎虫像个微型火箭，是世界上速度最快的昆虫，也可能是最凶悍的动物之一。
那么甲虎虫的速度究竟有多快呢？如果你把甲虎虫放在跑道上，它疾跑的速度跟人类快步走的速度是一样的。可能一小时八公里并不算神速，不过你想像一下，如果它和人一样大，那么它赢得一百米赛跑可只需要半秒钟！要捉住一只正以每小时四百八十公里的速度前进的甲虎虫，我们需要短程高速的赛车才行。
但是作为世界上最神速的动物也会有麻烦，甲虎虫跑得太快，几乎是什么也看不见了。当甲虎虫一动不动的时候，它的那双大眼睛看事物是正常的，但是一旦它飞跑起来，眼睛传达信息的速度就跟不上了，以至于无法看清周围的环境。甲虎虫是世界上跑得最快的动物——因为它简直是在“盲目”地狂奔。

血腥杀手：鲨鱼

排行榜上咬得最凶猛的动物就生活在海洋里。虽然并非如你所想的那样，但是说到撕咬，还有什么比得上电影《大白鲨》中的场景更让人惊心动魄的呢？无庸置疑，在撕咬这方面，没有其它动物能与大白鲨抗衡了。大白鲨嗜血如命，自然轻易地在排行榜上名列榜首。
人类的咬力一般只有大约每平方厘米21千克，相比之下，据估计，鲨鱼的上下颚能产生比人类大一百倍的力量。如果我们撕咬的力量也高达每平方厘米2800千克，我们会崩掉几颗牙齿。
因为拥有在海洋鲨鱼中最大的牙齿，达摩鲨堪称第一。科学家研究得知，达摩鲨虽然是世界上最小的鲨鱼之一，却能捕食地球上最大的动物——鲸鱼。鲸鱼才是达摩鲨通常所吃的食物，而非核潜艇，这也是为什么达摩鲨能在排行榜上名列榜首的原因。

多产之王：绦虫

这种寄生虫是地球上繁衍后代最多的生物。如果你能够像绦虫那样生育，你的子女将在两个星期内充斥整个纽约城——一天得生一百万个小宝宝呀！
绦虫的繁殖能力如此惊人，那是因为它们的生殖器官比其它动物都多。它们的身体就像长长的链条，由两千多个相同的节组成，几乎每一节都用来产卵。那是因为绦虫的生命循环意味着绦虫卵总会被其他动物吞噬。如果我们吃感染了绦虫的肉，我们体内也就带了绦虫。

想想这都觉得恐怖，或许在你的小肠里就潜伏着三百五十多种人体绦虫其中的一种。尽管你不愿意成为寄生虫的主人，但你还是不得不佩服绦虫惊人的繁殖能力。