Growers around the world are using new methods to grow grapes to make wine. They use natural and organic methods to control harmful insects and weeds instead of using chemicals. Now, a winery in Canada has adopted a natural way to control its grapevines (葡萄藤). The Featherstone Winery is in southern Ontario. The grapevines, like other plants, need to be cut every year.
Cutting grapevines must be done very carefully. Only a targeted area of leaves is removed from the lower part of the vines to help the grapes grow better. But at the Featherstone Winery, no man or machine does the cutting. Instead, the job is done by 40 little wooly lambs.
David Johnson owns the vineyard (葡萄园). He says he learned about using lambs while visiting wineries in New Zealand. The young lambs are perfectly designed to do the job. They eat the grape leaves on the lower parts of the vine. But they are not tall enough to reach the grapes. They only weigh about 22 kilograms, so they do not beat down the soil. And their waste makes good organic fertilizer. In addition, using the lambs costs much less than hiring workers to cut the vines for seven weeks in summer. And when the cutting is done in August, the lambs become tasty dishes.
Mr. Johnson says he had a difficult time finding enough lambs to do the job. There are about 50 million lambs in New Zealand. But there are not nearly as many in Ontario. Also, some organic pesticides (杀虫剂) are harmful to lambs. And the lambs must be watched to make sure they do not eat too much of the grapevines.
David Johnson says the lambs help him carry out his environmental ideas about farming. They are lovely and peaceful and he likes having them in his vineyard. People visiting the vineyard also enjoy watching the lambs do their job.
Farmers who grow grapes with natural and organic methods ________.
A.don't cut grapevines every year |
B.don't use chemicals to control harmful insects and weeds |
C.don't need to control harmful insects and weeds |
D.don't use organic fertilizer |
In order to help the grapes grow better, growers ________.
A.only have to remove the dead leaves |
B.need to remove a specific area of leaves |
C.shouldn't remove any part of the plants |
D.should let little lambs do the cutting |
Paragraph 4 is mainly about ________.
A.the future of getting lambs to do the cutting |
B.the worries about using organic pesticides |
C.the ways to get lambs to do the cutting |
D.the problems related to lambs doing the cutting |
We can infer from the passage that David Johnson ________.
A.owns several wineries in Canada |
B.buys lambs from New Zealand |
C.is concerned about protecting the environment |
D.loves keeping lambs instead of farming |