Health Centres & Wildlife in City Gardens IELTS Listening Answers

If you are practicing for your IELTS exam, you have likely encountered the “Health Centres” and “Wildlife in City Gardens” listening sections. Both of these recordings are widely recognized as Section 1 and Section 4 of the Cambridge IELTS 9 Listening Test 4.

Navigating these audio tracks can be tricky, especially with the classic IELTS distractors and spelling traps. To help you boost your score, here is a high-quality, complete breakdown of the answers, the context, and why each answer is correct.

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Part 1: Health Centres Listening Answers (Section 1)

Context: The first section features a conversation between a man looking to register his family at a local health practice and a receptionist guiding him through his options.

Question Types: Table Completion and Multiple Choice.

Answers & Explanations:

  1. babies: The speaker recommends Dr. Green because she is “especially good with babies.”
  2. Eshcol: The receptionist spells out E-S-H-C-O-L. (Always be prepared to write down spelled-out names in Section 1!)
  3. evening: Dr. Fuller is a great option because the clinic offers appointments in the “evening,” a key advantage for working patients.
  4. Gormley: Another spelling test! The receptionist clearly dictates G-O-R-M-L-E-Y.
  5. & 6. B (Employment medicals) & E (Vaccinations) (in any order): The recording explicitly states that fitness check-ups for employers and vaccinations for trips abroad are free of charge.
  6. heart: The smoking cessation talk is highlighted as useful for people with asthma or “heart” disease.
  7. primary school: Pay attention to the location change. The healthy eating talk isn’t at the health centre; it is being hosted at the “primary school.”
  8. 4.30: The late afternoon talk regarding exercise injuries is scheduled at 4.30.
  9. ages: The speaker notes that the injury avoidance talk is suitable for all “ages.”

Part 2: Wildlife in City Gardens Listening Answers (Section 4)

Context: Section 4 transitions into an academic monologue. A student is presenting the findings of an urban wildlife survey focusing on how species like frogs, hedgehogs, and song thrushes adapt to city gardens.

Question Types: Multiple Choice and Note Completion.

Answers & Explanations:

  1. C (They wanted to investigate a recent phenomenon): The researchers noticed sparrowhawks turning up in city gardens in great numbers and wanted to uncover why.
  2. A (Consulting some official documents): They confirmed the proportion of private garden land (24%) by looking at “large-scale usage maps in the town land survey office.”
  3. B (Keep a record of animals they saw): The surveyed participants were asked to tick off species they observed from a prepared list.
  4. B (Which they considered to be representative): The researchers deliberately chose smaller, typical gardens to look at the “norm, not the exception.”
  5. A (Wildlife problems in rural areas): As part of their background reading, they studied books detailing the “decline of wild animals in the countryside.”
  6. C (They best indicated general trends): The three chosen animal species were selected because they gave a good indication of the overall environmental processes at work.
  7. frogs: The data showed this species proliferates wherever there are “suitable stretches of water.”
  8. predators: Hedgehogs are surviving better in cities because their “predators” prefer to remain in rural environments.
  9. count: Because there were so many hedgehog sightings, the researchers found it incredibly easy to “count” them precisely.
  10. seeds: Song thrushes are experiencing a resurgence in urban gardens because the variety of plants provides an extensive range of “seeds” for them to eat.

Pro-Tips for IELTS Listening Success

  • Mind the word count: If the prompt specifies “ONE WORD ONLY,” writing “primary schools” instead of “primary school” will cost you the mark. Always double-check your pluralization.
  • Watch out for distractors: In the Health Centres audio, the speaker mentions “travel advice,” which might tempt you to select it, but only the vaccinations are strictly mentioned as free.
  • Anticipate the grammar: In table completions, looking at the words immediately before and after the blank can tell you if you need a noun, verb, or adjective.