An inference question with dates and physical clues tests what you can conclude from the text. Read the words leading into the blank to find what kind of ending it needs. Then put each clue in a few words and connect the dates to the evidence. Predict the smallest conclusion that uses all the clues without adding facts. Wrong choices may sound reasonable while claiming more than the text can show.
Hints
- Hint 1
Compare the dates for the mine and the refuse layers. Which event came first?
- Hint 2
Read the lesions and the chemical signature together. What does each tell you about the geese’s surroundings?
- Hint 3
Connect the mine’s closing to the later bone finds. How could you explain the timing and the geese’s surroundings together?
Step-by-step
Connect the timing to the bones
Step 1Put the events in order
The mine ceased operations around 850 C.E., while goose bones were absent from layers deposited before 860 C.E. and frequent afterward. Which event came first? The mine closed before goose bones began appearing in the refuse, so the blank needs a conclusion that connects the later finds to the earlier closure.
- Step 2
Trace the geese’s earlier surroundings
What do the lesions and chemical signature tell us about the geese? The lesions came from prolonged exposure to mineral-deficient soils, so they show how the soil affected the geese over time. The chemical signature matched the composition of soil surrounding a salt mine about 300 kilometers upstream. Together, these clues point to the mine region as a likely earlier home for the geese.
- Step 3
Predict only what the bones support
How far can that evidence take us? The geese probably reached the marketplace from the mine region, since the clues come from these goose bones. Resumed limited operations adds a mine reopening the passage never reports, and began importing salt adds salt shipments the bones can't show. Those claims go past the text.
- Step 4
Explain the timing and the arrival
Geese raised at the Danube marketplace assumes matching soils there, which the passage never reports. What would connect the mine’s closure to the later finds? Since this mine ceased operations around 850 C.E., residents had a possible reason to leave, and a move with their geese would explain the animals’ later appearance downstream. The phrase likely relocated treats that move as a possibility, not a certainty. Choice D.