美国国家公共电台 NPR The Oyster's Mighty Comeback Is Creating Cleaner U.S. Waterways

The Oyster¹'s Mighty² Comeback Is Creating Cleaner U.S. Waterways

ELISE HU, HOST:

Oyster farms are rapidly sprouting³ up along America's eastern shoreline. Production doubled in just the past six years, driven by the farm-to-table movement. As Delaware Public Media's James Morrison reports, the comeback of the oyster, which are filter feeders, are also good for our waterways.

JAMES MORRISON, BYLINE⁴: Jimmy Parks is shucking the meat out of a cell-phone-sized oyster shell and preparing to drop it into a deep fryer.

JIMMY PARKS: For my fried oyster platter, I do my - I toss the fries in Old Bay for a little more Maryland flair⁵.

MORRISON: Parks is a longtime chef and owner of The Butcher Station in Winchester, Va. He says the way we eat oysters⁶ has changed in the past 10 years.

PARKS: As much food as possibly can go on my plate at the least amount of money I can spend used to be the way things were. And now people are getting away from that, and they're gravitating more towards I want cleaner sources.

MORRISON: Not only are we demanding clean sources, we're becoming foodies. A decade ago, you probably would have just ordered oysters. Now, we pay attention to the taste profile, which is sometimes called a merroir of where our oysters come from. Oysters from New England are usually saltier than Chesapeake Bay oysters, which are considered milder and with a buttery finish.

PARKS: Now there's, I think, over 3,500 different varieties of oysters in the world, but only five species. So it's all about where they come from. So each area has a unique oyster to their water.

MORRISON: I'm heading out to Tim Devine's oyster farm in the Chesapeake Bay. He was a photographer in New York before starting Barren Island Oysters in Maryland five years ago.

TIM DEVINE: The cages come up, and then they dump them into here. The upfeed takes them up into our chipping mechanism⁷, which is - they call it a tumbler. It is essentially⁸ a rock tumbler that has some holes in it that sorts oysters.

MORRISON: Devine grows a strain of oysters that are immune to diseases that have devastated⁹ wild oyster populations, and his operation is sustainable. He's taking nothing out of the water except the nutrients¹⁰ his oysters have eaten, and he's putting nothing in but the cages that hold his oysters.

DEVINE: The coolest thing is within our cages we see these little shrimp-like creatures that actually eat the pseudofeces of the oysters. And then things like seahorses and crabs¹¹ and other things eat those little guys, and then the food chain has begun.

MORRISON: The cages are creating reef-like habitats, and that's helping¹² small sea creatures survive. But the biggest benefit of these farms could be their ability to filter water.

GULNIHAL OZBAY: Oyster tissue is being blended in the blender. So now they are going to process it.

MORRISON: Gulnihal Ozbay is an oyster researcher at the University of Delaware. She says oysters are filtering phytoplankton and excessive nutrients out of our waterways.

OZBAY: It's like almost like in the aquarium¹³ we have filters, same thing with oysters.

MORRISON: Farmed oysters are raised in clean, monitored waters, so they're basically making clean water cleaner. Ozbay says what we really need are sacrificial oysters in our most polluted waterways.

OZBAY: These are filter feeders. As they filter, they will accumulate some of the contaminants.

MORRISON: States like Virginia have these programs and are working to expand them. East Coast states are also processing a backlog¹⁴ of applications to lease thousands of acres of sea floor for new oyster farms. For NPR News, I'm James Morrison.

1 oyster   

n.牡蛎；沉默寡言的人

参考例句：

• I enjoy eating oyster; it's really delicious.我喜欢吃牡蛎，它味道真美。
• I find I fairly like eating when he finally persuades me to taste the oyster.当他最后说服我尝尝牡蛎时，我发现我相当喜欢吃。

2 mighty   

adj.强有力的；巨大的

参考例句：

• A mighty force was about to break loose.一股巨大的力量即将迸发而出。
• The mighty iceberg came into view.巨大的冰山出现在眼前。

3 sprouting   

v.发芽( sprout的现在分词 )；抽芽；出现；（使）涌现出

参考例句：

• new leaves sprouting from the trees 树上长出的新叶
• They were putting fresh earth around sprouting potato stalks. 他们在往绽出新芽的土豆秧周围培新土。 来自名作英译部分

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 flair   

n.天赋，本领，才华；洞察力

参考例句：

• His business skill complements her flair for design.他的经营技巧和她的设计才能相辅相成。
• He had a natural flair for business.他有做生意的天分。

6 oysters   

牡蛎( oyster的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We don't have oysters tonight, but the crayfish are very good. 我们今晚没有牡蛎供应。但小龙虾是非常好。
• She carried a piping hot grill of oysters and bacon. 她端出一盘滚烫的烤牡蛎和咸肉。

7 mechanism   

n.机械装置；机构，结构

参考例句：

• The bones and muscles are parts of the mechanism of the body.骨骼和肌肉是人体的组成部件。
• The mechanism of the machine is very complicated.这台机器的结构是非常复杂的。

8 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

9 devastated   

v.彻底破坏( devastate的过去式和过去分词)；摧毁；毁灭；在感情上（精神上、财务上等）压垮adj.毁坏的；极为震惊的

参考例句：

• The bomb devastated much of the old part of the city. 这颗炸弹炸毁了旧城的一大片地方。
• His family is absolutely devastated. 他的一家感到极为震惊。

10 nutrients   

n.（食品或化学品）营养物，营养品( nutrient的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a lack of essential nutrients 基本营养的缺乏
• Nutrients are absorbed into the bloodstream. 营养素被吸收进血液。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 crabs   

n.蟹( crab的名词复数 )；阴虱寄生病；蟹肉v.捕蟹( crab的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• As we walked along the seashore we saw lots of tiny crabs. 我们在海岸上散步时看到很多小蟹。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The fish and crabs scavenge for decaying tissue. 鱼和蟹搜寻腐烂的组织为食。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

13 aquarium   

n.水族馆，养鱼池，玻璃缸

参考例句：

• The first time I saw seals was in an aquarium.我第一次看见海豹是在水族馆里。
• I'm going to the aquarium with my parents this Sunday.这个星期天，我要和父母一起到水族馆去。

14 backlog   

n.积压未办之事

参考例句：

• It will take a month to clear the backlog of work.要花一个月的时间才能清理完积压的工作。
• Investment is needed to reduce the backlog of repairs.需要投资来減轻积压的维修工作。