The Amazing Tuna Fish Reading Answers

Nov 18, 2025

The answers for "The Amazing Tuna Fish Reading Answers" include 7 questions and are part of the assessment framework for the IELTS General Reading test. Candidates are allotted 10 minutes to complete the reading responses concerning "The Amazing Tuna Fish Reading Answers." This portion of the IELTS reading exam consists of different question formats, such as choosing no more than two words or number.

The answers for "The Amazing Tuna Fish Reading Answers" offer a comprehensive overview of Tuna, once a cheap food, which is now heavily overfished, with several species—especially bluefins—ranging from vulnerable to critically endangered despite their remarkable biological adaptations. Historically prized for thousands of years, bluefin tuna have shaped cultures, economies, and civilizations across the Mediterranean and Pacific regions. For additional practice with similar reading assessments, candidates can refer to the IELTS Reading Practice Test section.

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The Amazing Tuna Fish Reading Answers

Long prized as a food item, tuna is now being relentlessly overfished

Once regarded as a lowly sandwich filling, tuna fish has gone upmarket as a food item in the last sixty years, with an annual global market value of around $5.5 billion. One of the more popular varieties of tuna worldwide, the skipjack, has experienced the biggest rise in global annual catch over the last 50 years. A cheap plentiful fish, fishermen haul in 2.5 million tons of skipjack annually, much of which is canned. This is closely followed by the yellowfin with 1.5 million tons caught per year, followed by the bigeye at 0.5 million tons. The meat of these two varieties is often eaten raw, with the latter being particularly popular in Japan. With its mild flavor and firm white meat, the albacore is another popular canned tuna fish, with 0.25 million tons caught annually. Overfishing is a problem for tuna, and the conservation status of the main varieties range from 'vulnerable' in the case of the bigeye to 'near vulnerable' for the yellowfin and albacore. Additionally, there are three varieties of bluefin tuna-the Pacific, Atlantic and Southern. These are not extensively caught and are much less common, with the Pacific variety the only bluefin to escape the 'endangered' category. They, in common with the skipjack tuna, are put in the 'least concern' category. Of the three bluefins, the Southern bluefin is both the least numerous and least caught because it is regarded as a 'critically endangered' species. Tunas are supercharged fish, streamlined to perfection and jammed with state-of-the-art biological gear. The characteristics that distinguish them include great size, great range, efficient swimming stroke, warm bodies, large gills and clever physiology of the heart. All of these reach their apogee in the bluefin.

The three species of bluefin- the Atlantic, Pacific, and Southern- have divided the world's oceans among themselves, and they roam all regions except the polar.

A bluefin tuna swims with its mouth open, forcing water past the gills in a process called ram ventilation. Its gills have up to thirty times more surface area than those of other fish, and they extract nearly half of the oxygen dissolved in the water. If a bluefin ever stops swimming it suffocates. Tuna are unique amongst bony fish in their ability to keep key parts of their body warm. Rather than lose heat to cold water from the gills like most fish, tuna have heat exchange systems- a network of tightly packed parallel blood vessels that allow the transfer of heat between warm and cool blood moving in opposite directions. As a result, heat is retained in the body tissues rather than being lost through the gills.

The bluefin is one of the fastest fish in the ocean, thanks to a combination of specialized physical characteristics. Its large tail and the tapered shape of its body give optimum streamlining, as does the fact that some of the fins retract or fold into a depression in the body. Tuna have a greater proportion of red muscle fiber than do other fish, favoring long-distance swimming over short bursts.

And while most fish swim by undulating along their entire length, a tuna's body remains relatively rigid with only its tail whipping back and forth. Bluefin tuna are highly migratory fish, crossing seas around the world in yearly cycles of spawning and feeding. At least two groups share the Atlantic-one spawns in the Gulf of Mexico, the other in the Mediterranean. The groups mingle in the center of the ocean. Some fish even spend years on the opposite side of the ocean from where they spawn.

In evolutionary terms, the bluefin is a relatively modern fish, yet its relationship with humanity is ancient. Japanese fishermen have caught Pacific bluefin for more than 5,000 years. The Haida people of the Pacific Northwest region of North America have hunted the same species for at least as long, based on the evidence of discarded bluefin bones in their settlements. Stone Age people painted Atlantic bluefin tuna on the walls of Sicilian caves. Iron Age fishermen- Phoenician, Carthaginian, Greek, Roman, Moroccan, Turkish watched from promontories for the arrival of Bluefin schools at their Mediterranean spawning grounds. 'Bluefin helped build Western civilization' Stanford University professor Barbara Block, an eminent historian, said. 'Across all the Mediterranean, everybody netted giant tuna. The bluefin have annual migrations through the Strait of Gibraltar, and everyone knew when they came. In the Bosphorus there were thirty different words for bluefin, and everyone put out nets that had different names in the different countrie Netting created cash.' Bluefin meat was traded and the coins of the Ancient Greeks and Celts had giant bluefin on them.

1. Answer: 2.5

Supporting statement: “Fishermen haul in 2.5 million tons of skipjack annually.”

Keywords: 2.5 million tons

Keyword Location: Paragraph 1, Line 5

Explanation: The passage clearly states that the skipjack annual catch is 2.5 million tons. This is the only number associated with skipjack. Therefore, the correct figure to fill in the table is 2.5.

2. Answer: least concern

Supporting statement: “They, in common with the skipjack tuna, are put in the ‘least concern’ category.”

Keywords: least concern

Keyword Location: Paragraph 2, Line 6

Explanation: The text states that skipjack tuna shares the same conservation status as Pacific bluefin, which is “least concern.” Hence, this is the correct conservation category for skipjack.

3. Answer: Yellowfin

Supporting statement: “This is closely followed by the yellowfin with 1.5 million tons caught per year.”

Keywords: yellowfin, 1.5 million tons

Keyword Location: Paragraph 1, Line 6

Explanation: The passage clearly identifies yellowfin as the type of tuna with an annual catch of 1.5 million tons. No other species has this figure, so “Yellowfin” is the accurate answer.

4. Answer: vulnerable

Supporting statement: “The conservation status of the main varieties range from ‘vulnerable’ in the case of the bigeye…”

Keywords: vulnerable, bigeye

Keyword Location: Paragraph 1, Line 10

Explanation: The passage explicitly states that bigeye tuna is classified as “vulnerable.” This is the only conservation label given for bigeye, making it the correct entry.

5. Answer: 0.25

Supporting statement: “The albacore… with 0.25 million tons caught annually.”

Keywords: 0.25 million tons

Keyword Location: Paragraph 1, Line 9

Explanation: Albacore tuna has a clearly stated annual catch of 0.25 million tons in the passage. No other figure is associated with albacore, so “0.25” is the correct response.

6. Answer: Pacific

Supporting statement: “…the Pacific variety the only bluefin to escape the ‘least concern’ category.”

Keywords: Pacific, least concern

Keyword Location: Paragraph 2, Line 5

Explanation: Among the three bluefin species, only Pacific bluefin is labeled “least concern.” Therefore, the blank referring to a bluefin type with this status must be filled with “Pacific.”

7. Answer: Southern bluefin

Supporting statement: “…the Southern bluefin is… regarded as a ‘critically endangered’ species.”

Keywords: Southern bluefin, critically endangered

Keyword Location: Paragraph 2, Line 8

Explanation: The passage identifies Southern bluefin as “critically endangered.” No other bluefin species has this status, making “Southern bluefin” the correct answer for the table.

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