Cambridge IELTS 15 Listening Test 1 answers are set out in full on this page, with the official answer key for all 40 questions, clear explanations for every item, audio for all four parts, and complete transcripts to read alongside the recording.

The paper opens with a phone call about the Bankside recruitment agency, moves to a presentation by Matthews Island Holidays on its Isle of Man tour, then a discussion of birth order and personality traits, and closes with a lecture on the eucalyptus tree in Australia. Every explanation quotes the line from the recording that proves the answer, so you can see why each key word or letter is right and why the distractors fail.

Before you press play, skim the gaps in Parts 1 and 4 and predict the word class each one needs: the Section 1 strategy covers the note completion routine, and the Section 4 strategy keeps you oriented through ten unbroken lecture questions.

Section Walkthroughs

• Bankside Recruitment Agency (Questions 1–10) — audio, answers and a full transcript for this section
• Matthews Island Holidays (Questions 11–20) — audio, answers and a full transcript for this section
• Personality Traits (Questions 21–30) — audio, answers and a full transcript for this section
• The Eucalyptus Tree in Australia (Questions 31–40) — audio, answers and a full transcript for this section

Section 1 — Bankside Recruitment Agency

Questions 1–10

Complete the notes below.

Write ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

• Bankside Recruitment Agency
• Address of agency: 497 Eastside, Docklands
• Name of agent: Becky 1 …………
• Phone number: 07866 510333
• Best to call her in the 2 …………
• Typical jobs
• Clerical and admin roles, mainly in the finance industry
• Must have good 3 ………… skills
• Jobs are usually for at least one 4 …………
• Pay is usually £ 5 ………… per hour
• Registration process
• Wear a 6 ………… to the interview
• Must bring your 7 ………… to the interview
• They will ask questions about each applicant’s 8 …………
• Advantages of using an agency
• The 9 ………… you receive at interview will benefit you
• Will get access to vacancies which are not advertised
• Less 10 ………… is involved in applying for jobs

Section 1 Answer Explanations

1. Jamieson — William names the agent with “The agent I always deal with is called Becky Jamieson”, then dictates it letter by letter: “Jamieson J-A-M-I-E-S-O-N”. Becky is already printed in the note, so only the surname scores, spelled exactly as dictated.

2. afternoon — the advice is “I wouldn’t call her until the afternoon if I were you”, because “she’s always really busy in the morning”. Morning is the trap the negative until sets aside in favour of the afternoon.

3. communication — the priority for the receptionist role “isn’t so much having business skills or knowing lots of different computer systems – it’s communication that really matters”. Business skills and computer systems are named only to be ranked below communication.

4. week — Amber hopes for something “lasting at least a month”, but William says “you’re more likely to be offered something for a week at first, which might get extended”. A day or two is called unusual, so the usual minimum is one week.

5. 10 — “The hourly rate is about £10”, while “11 if you’re lucky” is conditional and Amber’s “eight or nine pounds an hour” is her mistaken expectation. The usual pay is 10, and the key also accepts ten.

6. suit — the clothing answer comes from Amber herself: “I can probably borrow a suit from Mum”. Smart and casual describe the choice of appearance; the noun the note needs after wear a is suit.

7. passport — certificates are refused with “they don’t need to see those”, but the passport is confirmed: “they will ask to see that”. The rejected document is the trap; the required one is the answer.

8. personality — William explains that “there are questions about personality that they always ask candidates – fairly basic ones”. Future plans are explicitly unlikely, so personality is the guaranteed interview topic.

9. feedback — the interview pays off because “they’ll give you feedback on your performance so you can improve next time”. Unadvertised vacancies belong to the following bullet, leaving feedback for this gap.

10. time — Amber’s summary closes the section: finding a job through the agency “takes a lot less time – it’s much easier than ringing up individual companies”. Less points to the noun time.

Section 2 — Matthews Island Holidays

Questions 11–14

Choose the correct letter, A , B or C .

• Matthews Island Holidays

11. According to the speaker, the company has been in business for longer than most of its competitors. arranges holidays to more destinations than its competitors. has more customers than its competitors.

• A — has been in business for longer than most of its competitors.
• B — arranges holidays to more destinations than its competitors.
• C — has more customers than its competitors.

12. Where can customers meet the tour manager before travelling to the Isle of Man? Liverpool Heysham Luton

• A — Liverpool
• B — Heysham
• C — Luton

13. How many lunches are included in the price of the holiday? three four five

• A — three
• B — four
• C — five

14. Customers have to pay extra for guaranteeing themselves a larger room. booking at short notice. transferring to another date.

• A — guaranteeing themselves a larger room.
• B — booking at short notice.
• C — transferring to another date.

Questions 15–20

Complete the table below.

Write ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

Section 2 Answer Explanations

11. A (has been in business for longer than most of its competitors) — the company builds on “many years’ experience – more than almost any other rail holiday company”. C fails because “we don’t aim to compete with other companies on the number of customers”, and B fails because she offers “perfect holidays in a small number of destinations”.

12. B (Heysham) — “Our holiday starts in Heysham, where your tour manager will meet you”. A fails because Liverpool is only where some travellers “go by train to Liverpool and take a ferry from there”, and C fails because others “prefer to fly from Luton instead”.

13. A (three) — the price covers “lunch on the three days when there are organised trips”. B fails because “day four is free”, and C fails because five counts “five breakfasts and dinners”, the wrong meals.

14. C (transferring to another date) — the only charge is for changes: “you’re welcome to change to an alternative date or a different tour, for a small administrative fee”. A fails because “there’s no supplement for single rooms in hotels”, and B fails because “the price is the same whether you book six months in advance or at the last minute”.

15. river — “The dining room looks out at the river”. Harbour is the trap, because the river merely flows on “close to where it flows into the harbour”; the view itself is of the river.

16. 1422 — Tynwald’s claim is that it “dates back to 979”, but the speaker notes that “the earliest surviving reference to it is from 1422”. The table’s note not 979 confirms the documented year is required, so write 1422.

17. top — Day 3 ends with “an eight-kilometre ride in the Snaefell Mountain Railway to the top”. Laxey is the fishing village passed through earlier, not the position the stem needs after the …… of Snaefell.

18. pass — Day 4 is free for exploring “using the pass which we’ll give you”, covering “travel on local transport” and “entrance to the island’s heritage sites”. The single word covering both perks is pass.

19. steam — the highlight of Day 5 is “a ride on the steam railway, from Douglas to Port Erin”. Electric was the Day 3 train to Laxey, so the adjective must change for the Day 5 railway.

20. capital — the coach reaches “Castletown, which used to be the capital of the Isle of Man”, with its “mediaeval castle” in the same sentence. Headland and the Calf of Man describe the earlier viewpoint, not the former …… with the old castle.

Section 3 — Personality Traits

Questions 21–26

What did findings of previous research claim about the personality traits a child is likely to have because of their position in the family?

Choose SIX answers from the box and write the correct letter, A-H , next to Questions

• A. outgoing
• B. selfish
• C. independent
• D. attention-seeking
• E. introverted
• F. co-operative
• G. caring
• H. competitive

• Personality Traits
• Position in family

21. the eldest child

22. a middle child

23. the youngest child

24. a twin

25. an only child

26. a child with much older siblings

Questions 27–28

Choose the correct letter, A , B or C .

27. What do the speakers say about the evidence relating to birth order and academic success? There is conflicting evidence about whether oldest children perform best in intelligence tests. There is little doubt that birth order has less influence on academic achievement than socio-economic status. Some studies have neglected to include important factors such as family size.

• A — There is conflicting evidence about whether oldest children perform best in intelligence tests.
• B — There is little doubt that birth order has less influence on academic achievement than socio-economic status.
• C — Some studies have neglected to include important factors such as family size.

28. What does Ruth think is surprising about the difference in oldest children’s academic performance? It is mainly thanks to their roles as teachers for their younger siblings. The advantages they have only lead to a slightly higher level of achievement. The extra parental attention they receive at a young age makes little difference.

• A — It is mainly thanks to their roles as teachers for their younger siblings.
• B — The advantages they have only lead to a slightly higher level of achievement.
• C — The extra parental attention they receive at a young age makes little difference.

Questions 29–30

Choose TWO letters, A-E .

29–30. Which TWO experiences of sibling rivalry do the speakers agree has been valuable for them? learning to share learning to stand up for oneself learning to be a good loser learning to be tolerant learning to say sorry

• A — learning to share
• B — learning to stand up for oneself
• C — learning to be a good loser
• D — learning to be tolerant
• E — learning to say sorry

Section 3 Answer Explanations

21. G (caring) — the studies saw the oldest child as nurturing, because in large families they were “expected to look after the younger ones”. D attention-seeking fails because the research’s only negative claim is that oldest children are “less well-adjusted”, not that they demand attention.

22. F (co-operative) — the trait most studies mention for a middle child is being “easier to get on with than older or younger siblings”, reinforced by “Generally eager to please and helpful”. H competitive fails because fights and envy describe Ruth’s own brother, and she says the finding is “certainly not accurate as far as my family goes”.

23. A (outgoing) — the research picture of the youngest child is of “a sociable and confident child who made friends easily”. E introverted fails because that is what Ed actually was — “but I was actually terribly shy” — and the task asks what the findings claimed.

24. E (introverted) — the twin study concluded a twin is “likely to be quite shy in social situations”, because “they always have their twin around to depend on for support”. A outgoing fails because it is the direct opposite and already labels the youngest child in Question 23.

25. B (selfish) — studies have “branded them as loners who think the world revolves around them”. H competitive fails because only children have “never had to fight for their parents’ attention”, so the research does not paint them as fighters.

26. C (independent) — children with much older siblings were said to “grow up more quickly and are expected to do basic things for themselves”. D attention-seeking fails because “playing the baby role and clamouring for special treatment” is Ed’s speculation, not a finding of previous research.

27. C (Some studies have neglected to include important factors such as family size.) — Ed identifies the flaw: “what many of them didn’t take into consideration was family size”. A fails because the intelligence-test decline “has been proved in lots of recent studies”, so the evidence is consistent, and B fails because low socioeconomic status “can also account for differences between siblings in academic performance”.

28. A (It is mainly thanks to their roles as teachers for their younger siblings.) — Ruth calls the reason surprising and gives it as the fact that “they benefit from being teachers for their younger siblings”. C fails because “It’s not only that they benefit intellectually from extra attention at a young age”, and B fails because the “marginally higher academic performance” is fact, not the surprise.

29. B (learning to stand up for oneself) — Ruth says the rivalry “has made me a stronger person” and “I know how to defend myself”. A learning to share fails because Ed admits “I was never prepared to let me brothers use any of my stuff”, so sharing is what he did not gain.

30. D (learning to be tolerant) — tolerance is Ruth’s other gain: “we had to put up with each other and most of the time we co-existed amicably enough”. E learning to say sorry fails because “I would have died rather than apologise to him”. Questions 29 and 30 accept B and D in either order.

Section 4 — The Eucalyptus Tree in Australia

Questions 31–40

Complete the notes below.

Write ONE WORD ONLY for each answer.

(i) ‘Mundulla Yellows’

– trees were unable to take in necessary iron through their roots

(ii) ‘Bell-miner Associated Die-back’

– they secrete a substance containing sugar

– bell-miner birds are attracted by this and keep away other species

William Jackson’s theory:

• The Eucalyptus Tree in Australia
• Importance
• it provides 31 ………… and food for a wide range of species
• its leaves provide 32 ………… which is used to make a disinfectant
• Reasons for present decline in number
• A) Diseases
• Cause – lime used for making 33 ………… was absorbed
• Cause – 34 ………… feed on eucalyptus leaves
• B) Bushfires
• high-frequency bushfires have impact on vegetation, resulting in the growth of 35 …………
• mid-frequency bushfires result in the growth of eucalyptus forests, because they:
• – make more 36 ………… available to the trees
• – maintain the quality of the 37 …………
• low-frequency bushfires result in the growth of ‘ 38 ………… rainforest’, which is:
• – a 39 ………… Ecosystem
• – an ideal environment for the 40 ………… of the bell-miner

Section 4 Answer Explanations

31. shelter — the importance list opens with the fact that “it gives shelter to creatures like birds and bats”, with food following as “particularly the nectar from its flowers”. The printed pairing …… and food needs the first benefit, shelter.

32. oil — the human use is “a disinfectant made from oil extracted from eucalyptus leaves”. Leaves and disinfectant are the traps: oil is the substance between the source and the product.

33. roads — the cause was lime, “or calcium hydroxide to give it its proper chemical name”, harmful because it “was being used in the construction of roads”. The note asks what the lime was making when it washed into the ground, not its chemical name.

34. insects — the second disease begins with the fact that “insects settle on the leaves and eat their way round them”, which the note paraphrases as feed on eucalyptus leaves. The bell-miner is the trap: the birds chase others away, but the eaters are insects.

35. grass — very frequent bushfires mean “this encourages grass to grow afterwards”, matching the note’s high-frequency. Less frequent fires bring the “growth of eucalyptus forests”, which belongs to the mid-frequency branch; the key also accepts grasses.

36. water — one benefit of fairly frequent fire is that “the fire stops the growth of other species which would consume water needed by eucalyptus trees”. The note says make more …… available, so the noun freed up is water, one word only.

37. soil — quick-growing species also harm the trees “by affecting the composition of the soil, and removing nutrients from it”. Nutrients is the trap, because the note asks about the quality of the ……, which is the soil’s.

38. dry — reduced burning “had led to what’s known as ‘dry rainforest’”. The label sounds contradictory, since “usually we associate tropical rainforest with wet conditions”, yet dry is the word needed before rainforest.

39. simple — the lecture contrasts the forest types: “unlike tropical rainforest which is a rich ecosystem, this type of ecosystem is usually a simple one”. Rich belongs to the tropical type, so simple fills the note.

40. nests — the undergrowth suits the bell-miner, “which builds its nests in the undergrowth there”. The note reads an ideal environment for the …… of the bell-miner, so the noun is nests; the key also accepts nest.

Cambridge IELTS 15 Listening Test 1 Answers

Questions and Answers

Listening Transcripts

Section 1 Transcript

AMBER: Hello William. This is Amber – you said to phone if I wanted to get more information about the job agency you mentioned. Is now a good time?

WILLIAM: Oh, hi Amber. Yes. Fine. So the agency I was talking about is called Bankside – they’re based in Docklands – I can tell you the address now – 497 Eastside.

AMBER: OK, thanks. So is there anyone in particular I should speak to there?

WILLIAM: The agent I always deal with is called Becky Jamieson.

AMBER: Let me write that down – Becky …

WILLIAM: Jamieson J-A-M-I-E-S-O-N.

AMBER: Do you have her direct line?

WILLIAM: Yes, it’s in my contacts somewhere – right, here we are: 078 double 6, 510 triple 3. I wouldn’t call her until the afternoon if I were you – she’s always really busy in the morning trying to fill last-minute vacancies. She’s really helpful and friendly so I’m sure it would be worth getting in touch with her for an informal chat.

AMBER: It’s mainly clerical and admin jobs they deal with, isn’t it?

WILLIAM: That’s right. I know you’re hoping to find a full-time job in the media eventually – but Becky mostly recruits temporary staff for the finance sector – which will look good on your CV – and generally pays better too.

AMBER: Yeah – I’m just a bit worried because I don’t have much office experience.

WILLIAM: I wouldn’t worry. They’ll probably start you as a receptionist, or something like that. So what’s important for that kind of job isn’t so much having business skills or knowing lots of different computer systems – it’s communication that really matters – so you’d be fine there. And you’ll pick up office skills really quickly on the job. It’s not that complicated.

AMBER: OK good. So how long do people generally need temporary staff for? It would be great if I could get something lasting at least a month.

WILLIAM: That shouldn’t be too difficult. But you’re more likely to be offered something for a week at first, which might get extended. It’s unusual to be sent somewhere for just a day or two.

AMBER: Right, I’ve heard the pay isn’t too bad – better than working in a shop or a restaurant.

WILLIAM: Oh yes – definitely. The hourly rate is about £10, 11 if you’re lucky.

AMBER: That’s pretty good. I was only expecting to get eight or nine pounds an hour.

————————————————

WILLIAM: Do you want me to tell you anything about the registration process?

AMBER: Yes, please. I know you have to have an interview.

WILLIAM: The interview usually takes about an hour and you should arrange that about a week in advance.

AMBER: I suppose I should dress smartly if it’s for office work – I can probably borrow a suit from Mum.

WILLIAM: Good idea. It’s better to look too smart than too casual.

AMBER: Will I need to bring copies of my exam certificates or anything like that?

WILLIAM: No – they don’t need to see those, I don’t think.

AMBER: What about my passport?

WILLIAM: Oh yes – they will ask to see that.

AMBER: OK.

WILLIAM: I wouldn’t get stressed about the interview though. It’s just a chance for them to build a relationship with you – so they can try and match you to a job which you’ll like. So there are questions about personality that they always ask candidates – fairly basic ones. And they probably won’t ask anything too difficult like what your plans are for the future.

AMBER: Hope not.

WILLIAM: Anyway, there are lots of benefits to using an agency – for example, the interview will be useful because they’ll give you feedback on your performance so you can improve next time.

AMBER: And they’ll have access to jobs which aren’t advertised.

WILLIAM: Exactly – most temporary jobs aren’t advertised.

AMBER: And I expect finding a temporary job this way takes a lot less time – it’s much easier than ringing up individual companies.

WILLIAM: Yes indeed. Well I think …

Section 2 Transcript

Good morning. My name’s Erica Matthews, and I’m the owner of Matthews Island Holidays, a company set up by my parents. Thank you for coming to this presentation, in which I hope to interest you in what we have to offer. We’re a small, family-run company, and we believe in the importance of the personal touch, so we don’t aim to compete with other companies on the number of customers. What we do is build on our many years’ experience – more than almost any other rail holiday company – to ensure we provide perfect holidays in a small number of destinations, which we’ve got to know extremely well.

I’ll start with our six-day Isle of Man holiday. This is a fascinating island in the Irish Sea, with Wales to the south, England to the east, Scotland to the north and Northern Ireland to the west. Our holiday starts in Heysham, where your tour manager will meet you, then you’ll travel by ferry to the Isle of Man. Some people prefer to fly from Luton instead, and another popular option is to go by train to Liverpool and take a ferry from there.

You have five nights in the hotel, and the price covers five breakfasts and dinners, and lunch on the three days when there are organised trips: day four is free, and most people have lunch in a café or restaurant in Douglas.

The price of the holiday includes the ferry to the Isle of Man, all travel on the island, the hotel, and the meals I’ve mentioned. Incidentally, we try to make booking our holidays as simple and fair as possible, so unlike with many companies, the price is the same whether you book six months in advance or at the last minute, and there’s no supplement for single rooms in hotels. If you make a booking then need to change the start date, for example because of illness, you’re welcome to change to an alternative date or a different tour, for a small administrative fee.

——————————

OK, so what does the holiday consist of? Well, on day one you’ll arrive in time for a short introduction by your tour manager, followed by dinner in the hotel. The dining room looks out at the river, close to where it flows into the harbour, and there’s usually plenty of activity going on.

On day two you’ll take the coach to the small town of Peel, on the way calling in at the Tynwald Exhibition. The Isle of Man isn’t part of the United Kingdom, and it has its own parliament, called Tynwald. It’s claimed that this is the world’s oldest parliament that’s still functioning, and that it dates back to 979. However, the earliest surviving reference to it is from 1422, so perhaps it isn’t quite as old as it claims!

Day three we have a trip to the mountain Snaefell. This begins with a leisurely ride along the promenade in Douglas in a horse-drawn tram. Then you board an electric train which takes you to the fishing village of Laxey. From there it’s an eight-kilometre ride in the Snaefell Mountain Railway to the top. Lunch will be in the café, giving you spectacular views of the island.

Day four is free for you to explore, using the pass which we’ll give you. So you won’t have to pay for travel on local transport, or for entrance to the island’s heritage sites. Or you might just want to take it easy in Douglas and perhaps do a little light shopping.

The last full day, day five, is for some people the highlight of the holiday, with a ride on the steam railway, from Douglas to Port Erin. After some time to explore, a coach will take you to the headland that overlooks the Calf of Man, a small island just off the coast. From there you continue to Castletown, which used to be the capital of the Isle of Man, and its mediaeval castle.

And on day six it’s back to the ferry – or the airport, if you flew to the island – and time to go home.

Now I’d like to tell you …

Section 3 Transcript

RUTH: Ed, how are you getting on with the reading for our presentation next week?

ED: Well, OK, Ruth – but there’s so much of it.

RUTH: I know, I hadn’t realised birth order was such a popular area of research.

ED: But the stuff on birth order and personality is mostly unreliable. From what I’ve been reading a lot of claims about how your position in the family determines certain personality traits are just stereotypes, with no robust evidence to support them.

RUTH: OK, but that’s an interesting point – we could start by outlining what previous research has shown. There are studies going back over a hundred years.

ED: Yeah – so we could just run through some of the typical traits. Like the consensus seems to be that oldest children are generally less well-adjusted because they never get over the arrival of a younger sibling.

RUTH: Right, but on a positive note, some studies claimed that they were thought to be good a nurturing – certainly in the past when people had large families they would have been expected to look after the younger ones.

ED: There isn’t such a clear picture for middle children – but one trait that a lot of the studies mention is that they are easier to get on with than older or younger siblings.

RUTH: Generally eager to please and helpful – although that’s certainly not accurate as far as my family goes – my middle brother was a nightmare – always causing fights and envious of whatever I had.

ED: As I said – none of this seems to relate to my own experience. I’m the youngest in my family and I don’t recognise myself in any of the studies I’ve read about. I’m supposed to have been a sociable and confident child who made friends easily – but I was actually terribly shy.

RUTH: Really? That’s funny. There have been hundreds of studies on twins but mostly about nurture versus nature…

ED: There was one on personality, which said that a twin is likely to be quite shy in social situations because they always have their twin around to depend on for support.

RUTH: My cousins were like that when they were small – they were only interested in each other and found it hard to engage with other kids. They’re fine now though.

ED: Only children have had a really bad press – a lot of studies have branded them as loners who think the world revolves around them because they’ve never had to fight for their parents’ attention.

RUTH: That does seem a bit harsh. One category I hadn’t considered before was children with much older siblings – a couple of studies mentioned that these children grow up more quickly and are expected to do basic things for themselves – like getting dressed.

ED: I can see how that might be true – although I expect they’re sometimes the exact opposite – playing the baby role and clamouring for special treatment.

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RUTH: What was the problem with most of these studies, do you think?

ED: I think it was because in a lot of cases data was collected from only one sibling per family, who rated him or herself and his or her siblings at the same time.

RUTH: Mmm. Some of the old research into the relationship between birth order and academic achievement has been proved to be accurate though. Performances in intelligence tests decline slightly from the eldest child to his or her younger siblings. This has been proved in lots of recent studies.

ED: Yes. Although what many of them didn’t take into consideration was family size. The more siblings there are, the likelier the family is to have a low socioeconomic status – which can also account for differences between siblings in academic performance.

RUTH: The oldest boy might be given more opportunities than his younger sisters, for example.

ED: Exactly.

RUTH: But the main reason for the marginally higher academic performance of oldest children is quite surprising, I think. It’s not only that they benefit intellectually from extra attention at a young age – which is what I would have expected. It’s that they benefit from being teachers for their younger siblings, by verbalising processes.

ED: Right, and this gives them status and confidence, which again contribute, in a small way, to better performance.

So would you say sibling rivalry has been a useful thing for you?

RUTH: I think so – my younger brother was incredibly annoying and we found a lot but I think this has made me a stronger person. I know how to defend myself. We had some terrible arguments and I would have died rather than apologise to him – but we had to put up with each other and most of the time we co-existed amicably enough.

ED: Yes, my situation was pretty similar. But I don’t think having two older brothers made me any less selfish – I was never prepared to let me brothers use any of my stuff …

RUTH: That’s perfectly normal, whereas …

Section 4 Transcript

Today I’m going to talk about the eucalyptus tree. This is a very common tree here in Australia, where it’s also sometimes called the gum tree. First I’m going to talk about why it’s important, then I’m going to describe some problems it faces at present.

Right, well the eucalyptus tree is an important tree for lots of reasons. For example, it gives shelter to creatures like birds and bats, and these and other species also depend on it for food, particularly the nectar from its flowers. So it supports biodiversity. It’s useful to us humans too, because we can kill germs with a disinfectant made from oil extracted from eucalyptus leaves.

The eucalyptus grows all over Australia and the trees can live for up to four hundred years. So it’s alarming that all across the country, numbers of eucalyptus are falling because the trees are dying off prematurely. So what are the reasons for this?

One possible reason is disease. As far back as the 1970s the trees started getting a disease called Mundulla Yellows. The trees’ leaves would gradually turn yellow, then the tree would die. It wasn’t until 2004 that they found the cause of the problem was lime, or calcium hydroxide to give it its proper chemical name, which was being used in the construction of roads. The lime was being washed away into the ground and affecting the roots of the eucalyptus trees nearby. What is was doing was preventing the trees from sucking up the iron they needed for healthy growth. When this was injected back into the affected trees, they immediately recovered.

But this problem only affected a relatively small number of trees. By 2000, huge numbers of eucalyptus were dying along Australia’s East Coast, of a disease known as Bell-miner Associated Die-back. The bell-miner is a bird, and the disease seems to be common where there are high populations of bell-miners. Again it’s the leaves of the trees that are affected. What happens is that insects settle on the leaves and eat their way round them, destroying them as they go, and at the same time they secrete a solution which has sugar in it. The bell-miner birds really like this solution, and in order to get as much as possible, they keep away other creatures that might try to get it. So these birds and insects flourish at the expense of other species, and eventually so much damage is done to the leaves that the tree dies.

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But experts say that trees can start looking sick before any sign of Bell-miner Associated Die-back. So it looks as if the problem might have another explanation. One possibility is that it’s to do with the huge bushfires that we have in Australia. A theory proposed over 40 years ago be ecologist William Jackson is that the frequency of bushfires in a particular region affects the type of vegetation that grows there. If there are very frequent bushfires in a region, this encourages grass to grow afterwards, while if the bushfires are rather less frequent, this results in the growth of eucalyptus forests.

So why is this? Why do fairly frequent bushfires actually support the growth of eucalyptus? Well, one reason is that the fire stops the growth of other species which would consume water needed by eucalyptus trees. And there’s another reason. If these other quick-growing species of bushes and plants are allowed to proliferate, they harm the eucalyptus in another way, by affecting the composition of the soil, and removing nutrients from it. So some bushfires are actually essential for the eucalyptus to survive as long as they are not too frequent. In fact there’s evidence that Australia’s indigenous people practised regular burning of bush land for thousands of years before the arrival of the Europeans.

But since Europeans arrived on the continent, the number of bushfires has been strictly controlled. Now scientists believe that this reduced frequency of bushfires to low levels had led to what’s known as ‘dry rainforest’, which seems an odd name as usually we associate tropical rainforest with wet conditions. And what’s special about this type of rainforest? Well, unlike tropical rainforest which is a rich ecosystem, this type of ecosystem is usually a simple one. It has very thick, dense vegetation, but not much variety of species. The vegetation provides lots of shade, so one species that does find it ideal is the bell-miner bird, which builds its nests in the undergrowth there. But again that’s not helpful for the eucalyptus tree.

Listening Band Score Conversion

Your raw score out of 40 converts to an IELTS band score using the official listening conversion table below.

Key Vocabulary and Spelling

Study Tips

Parts 1 and 4 are pure completion tasks with different word limits. Part 1 allows ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER, so Question 5 scores with 10 or with ten, while Part 4 allows ONE WORD ONLY, so Question 36 must be water alone and Question 40 nests as the transcript says it. Read the limit printed under each task before the audio starts, because a correct word in the wrong form scores zero — the table completion strategy walks through the full routine.

Spelling settles marks across the paper: Jamieson dictated letter by letter in Question 1, the digits 1422 against the tempting 979 in Question 16, and mediaeval beside the castle in Question 20. Numbers written as digits never misspell, and drilled double letters carry the rest.

Parts 2 and 3 load the paper with option-based tasks, and the wrong options borrow the recording’s own words. Customers, destinations and last-minute bookings are all voiced in Part 2 yet none of them scores Question 11 or 14; in Part 3 the speakers’ relatives behave opposite to the research claims and answer nothing. Eliminate what the speakers cancel — the multiple choice strategy covers that method step by step — and remember that Questions 29 and 30 accept their two letters in either order.

Give Part 4 your full attention for ten unbroken questions: there is no second speaker and no pause to reset your place, and the lecture’s headings — diseases, then bushfires at three frequencies — are the only map you get. Log your raw score out of 40 after marking, then attack your weakest task type in the next practice paper rather than replaying the same test.

Practice More Listening Tests

Mark the paper honestly, then keep the momentum going with the free IELTS listening practice course from Simply IELTS, which drills every task type that appeared in this test: note completion, table completion, multiple choice, matching and Choose TWO questions. When you are ready for another full paper under timed conditions, try this interactive listening test: labyrinths first. Compare your raw score with the band table above, review the explanation for every question you missed, and start a fresh test only when word limits and spelling stop costing you marks.