The cane toad is a large (1.8 kg) amphibian species native to Central and South America. It was deliberately introduced to Australia in 1935 with the expectation that it would protect farmers’ crops by eating harmful insects. Unfortunately, the toad multiplied rapidly, and a large cane toad population now threatens small native animals that are not pests. Several measures have been proposed to stop the spread of the cane toad in Australia.
One way to prevent the spread of the toad would be to build a national fence. A fence that blocks the advance of the toads will prevent them from moving into those parts of Australia that they have not yet colonized. This approach has been used before: a national fence was erected in the early part of the twentieth century to prevent the spread of rabbits, another animal species that was introduced in Australia from abroad and had a harmful impact on its native ecosystems.
Second, the toads could be captured and destroyed by volunteers. Cane toads can easily be caught in simple traps and can even be captured by hand. Young toads and cane toad eggs are even easier to gather and destroy, since they are restricted to the water. If the Australian government were to organize a campaign among Australian citizens to join forces to destroy the toads, the collective effort might stop the toad from spreading.
Third, researchers are developing a disease-causing virus to control the cane toad populations. This virus will be specially designed: although it will be able to infect a number of reptile and amphibian species, it will not harm most of the infected species; it will specifically harm only the cane toads. The virus will control the population of cane toads by preventing them from maturing and reproducing.
The lecturer completely refutes the reading passage. The speaker uses three points to indicate that none of the solutions which are given in the article is effective to stop the spread of the cane toads in Australia.
First, although a fence was successful to stop rabbits from spreading back in the beginning of the twentieth century, a fence would not stop cane toads from spreading. This is because young toads and eggs are usually found in rivers and streams and they could cross the fence to new areas and establish new habitats. This fact shows that building a national fence would be unlikely to stop cane toads from spreading.
Second, even though cane toads can be easily captured and destroyed by volunteers, other species might be destroyed as well. The professor mentions that there are many endangered frog species which live alongside with cane toads and they look similar to each other. Thus, untrained volunteers might hunt and destroy other young frogs instead of cane toads. This would cause other unwanted problem to the environment.
Finally, it is true that researchers have developed a virus that targets the cane toads reproductive system and prevents them from reproduction, but it will infect other reptiles that usually get transferred to Central and South America. These reptiles will transmit the virus to the cane toads in both Americas where native cane toads live. This solution is not practical because it will destroy one of the most important species in the Americas.
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, look, second, so, thus, well, it is true
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 11.0 10.4613686534 105% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 5.04856512141 198% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 7.30242825607 137% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 12.0772626932 75% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 17.0 22.412803532 76% => OK
Preposition: 27.0 30.3222958057 89% => OK
Nominalization: 3.0 5.01324503311 60% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1263.0 1373.03311258 92% => OK
No of words: 248.0 270.72406181 92% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.09274193548 5.08290768461 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 3.96837696647 4.04702891845 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.47610524098 2.5805825403 96% => OK
Unique words: 140.0 145.348785872 96% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.564516129032 0.540411800872 104% => OK
syllable_count: 376.2 419.366225166 90% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.55342163355 97% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 3.25607064018 184% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.23620309051 49% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 1.25165562914 160% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.51434878587 66% => OK
Preposition: 0.0 2.5761589404 0% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 12.0 13.0662251656 92% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 21.2450331126 94% => OK
Sentence length SD: 49.1281628894 49.2860985944 100% => OK
Chars per sentence: 105.25 110.228320801 95% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.6666666667 21.698381199 95% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.08333333333 7.06452816374 72% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 4.19205298013 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 3.0 4.33554083885 69% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 4.45695364238 112% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.27373068433 94% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.227610572975 0.272083759551 84% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0838622465832 0.0996497079465 84% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0576375050703 0.0662205650399 87% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.131125691813 0.162205337803 81% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0387471892084 0.0443174109184 87% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.9 13.3589403974 97% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 59.64 53.8541721854 111% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 5.55761589404 56% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.9 11.0289183223 90% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.24 12.2367328918 100% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.51 8.42419426049 101% => OK
difficult_words: 61.0 63.6247240618 96% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 9.0 10.7273730684 84% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 10.498013245 95% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.2008830022 89% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.