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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How did humans hurt the dodo population indirectly?
(a) By introducing competitors for food.
(b) By breaking up dodo populations for colonization to other islands.
(c) By collecting too many dodos for scientific study.
(d) By competing for the dodo's food supply themselves.

2. What does David Quammen invoke as he describes cutting the rug?
(a) The despair of the threads.
(b) The dissolution of the design.
(c) The joy of the scissors.
(d) The outrage of the rug weavers.

3. Who was Truganini?
(a) A researcher in Tasmania.
(b) A naturalists who studied the Tasmanian tiger.
(c) The last surviving Tasmanian woman.
(d) A sailor who reported on Tasmanian tigers.

4. What family does Quammen say hippopotamuses and deer belong to?
(a) Anamnia.
(b) Monorhina.
(c) Marsupials.
(d) Ungulates.

5. What advice did Darwin receive from his friends, with regard to Wallace's work?
(a) To work with Wallace and publish a joint theory.
(b) Publish an outline quickly.
(c) Credit Wallace and share the glory with him.
(d) To buy Wallace's notes from him, and pledge him to silence.

6. What is a thylacine?
(a) A kangaroo.
(b) A Tasmanian tiger.
(c) A crab.
(d) A kestrel.

7. Where did the dodo nest?
(a) In trees.
(b) In burrows.
(c) In man-made structures.
(d) On the ground.

8. What ecosystem does Wallace distinguish from ecosystems that developed in isolation?
(a) Ecosystems where great complexity developed out of local conditions.
(b) Ecosystems where people had introduced new species.
(c) Ecosystems that had been part of a larger land mass, but broke away.
(d) Ecosystems that were simplified over time.

9. What is the Guam rail?
(a) A dog.
(b) A bird.
(c) A rabbit.
(d) A marsupial.

10. What literary term describes Quammen's use of the image of the Persian rug?
(a) Symbolism.
(b) Personification.
(c) Simile.
(d) Metaphor.

11. What was Tasmania's environmental history, according to Quammen?
(a) It was isolated by a growing mountain range in India.
(b) It experienced a catastrophic eruption that killed off everything on the island, before life returned slowly.
(c) It was formed by a volcano in the sea.
(d) It was separated from Australia by water.

12. What does a species have if it has high dispersal ability?
(a) The ability to adapt to new environmental conditions.
(b) The ability to change their environment to suit their own traits.
(c) The ability to withstand great environmental changes.
(d) The ability to move from place to place.

13. What is the relationship Quammen develops between the imaginary rug and ecosystems?
(a) Analogy.
(b) Synecdoche.
(c) Symbolism.
(d) Extended metaphor.

14. How many pieces does Quammen ask the reader to imagine the rug being cut into?
(a) 12.
(b) 144.
(c) 36.
(d) 6.

15. How does Quammen find fault with other scientists studying extinctions?
(a) By saying that their fundamental premises were ungrounded.
(b) By saying that they have only been talking to each other.
(c) By saying that their nostalgia clouds their findings.
(d) By saying that their vocabulary is insufficient to the problems.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Quammen say about the overall pattern on this hypothetical rug?

2. What traits did sailors notice in animals on remote islands?

3. Where did Wallace travel after the Amazon?

4. Where did Quammen go to study temrecs?

5. How did humans hurt the dodo population directly?

(see the answer keys)

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