美国国家公共电台 NPR Planning For The Future Of A Park Where The Trees Have One Name

Planning For The Future Of A Park Where The Trees Have One Name

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

One hundred years ago this month, the National Park Service was founded to protect the nation's iconic landscapes. Now, many of those landscapes face a new risk - a warming climate. Lauren Sommer from member station KQED takes us to Joshua Tree National Park in the southern California desert where the park's namesake tree is disappearing.

LAUREN SOMMER, BYLINE¹: Joshua trees are weird². They've got shaggy bark, twisted branches and needle-like leaves.

CAMERON BARROWS: It's something that you don't even imagine could live on Earth, and here it is. It's something very alien.

SOMMER: Cameron Barrows is standing³ right underneath⁴ one.

BARROWS: It's like a Dr. Seuss book.

SOMMER: And if these are Dr. Seuss trees, then Barrows is the Lorax who speaks for the trees. He's an ecologist with the University of California, Riverside.

BARROWS: So the biggest ones over there, those could be anywhere from 150 to 250 years old.

SOMMER: They stretch across the dusty valley we're in where Barrows and his research team are trying to find out what will happen to the trees that this national park is named after.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: This one is 690 and 31.

SOMMER: The team uses yardsticks⁵ to map out the Joshua trees and monitor them year after year. And to the untrained eye, it looks pretty good here - big Joshua trees. But that worries Barrows.

BARROWS: We want to see babies, and what we're not seeing are individual seedlings⁶ that are coming up.

SOMMER: The youngest trees here are 30 to 40 years old, which means seedlings aren't surviving. And the likely culprit, Barrow says, is climate change. Joshua trees already live in harsh conditions.

BARROWS: They're well-adapted to what we have now, but you turn up the temperature a couple of degrees and that would be the end of most of these plants.

SOMMER: Barrows expects Joshua tree habitat in the park to shrink by as much as 90 percent by the end of the century. But he says that doesn't mean the park has to change its name.

BARROWS: There's a little one sprouting⁷ there. There's another one over there.

SOMMER: About half an hour away, Barrows is finding baby Joshua trees. The difference is that we're at a higher elevation⁸, so it's a little cooler and wetter.

BARROWS: There are these little niches⁹ within this landscape that should be able to sustain Joshua trees.

KRISTEN LALUMIERE: Yeah, this site is actually looking pretty good.

SOMMER: Kristen Lalumiere is also scoping out the baby Joshua trees, which just come up to her knee. She's a biologist with the National Park Service.

LALUMIERE: You walk to a site like this where there are some and your spirits lift.

SOMMER: She says the park is looking at how to protect the trees in these small high elevation pockets, either by keeping out wildfires or controlling invasive species.

JON JARVIS: We are already seeing the effects of climate change throughout the national park system.

SOMMER: Jon Jarvis is director of the National Park Service. He says sea level rise threatens the Everglades of Everglades National Park in Florida. Glacier¹⁰ National Park in Montana will lose its glaciers¹¹. And that complicates¹² things for the National Park Service, he says. Until now, the goal has been preserving parks, keeping things the same. Now, they may have to let plants and animals move. And they'll have to help the public understand what's happening.

JARVIS: These are places that people care about. And maybe it can stimulate¹³ their own actions as a result of seeing the effects of climate change in international parks.

SOMMER: Jarvis hopes that a hundred years from now the Joshua trees that visitors see in the national park aren't just in pictures on the welcome sign. For NPR News, I'm Lauren Sommer in Joshua Tree National Park.

1 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。

2 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

3 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

4 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

5 yardsticks   

比较或衡量的标准，尺度( yardstick的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Your success in life can be measured by many yardsticks. 你在生活方面的成功是可以用许多标准来衡量的。
• Common yardsticks for measuring success are cost, choice, performance, and security. 判断一个操作系统是否成功的通用尺度包括成本、普及度、性能和安全性。

6 seedlings   

n.刚出芽的幼苗( seedling的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Ninety-five per cent of the new seedlings have survived. 新栽的树苗95%都已成活。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• In such wet weather we must prevent the seedlings from rotting. 这样的阴雨天要防止烂秧。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

7 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

8 elevation   

n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高

参考例句：

• The house is at an elevation of 2,000 metres.那幢房子位于海拔两千米的高处。
• His elevation to the position of General Manager was announced yesterday.昨天宣布他晋升总经理职位。

9 niches   

壁龛( niche的名词复数 )； 合适的位置[工作等]； （产品的）商机； 生态位（一个生物所占据的生境的最小单位）

参考例句：

• Some larvae extend the galleries to form niches. 许多幼虫将坑道延伸扩大成壁龛。
• In his view differences in adaptation are insufficient to create niches commensurate in number and kind. 按照他的观点，适应的差异不足以在数量上和种类上形成同量的小生境。

10 glacier   

n.冰川，冰河

参考例句：

• The glacier calved a large iceberg.冰河崩解而形成一个大冰山。
• The upper surface of glacier is riven by crevasses.冰川的上表面已裂成冰隙。

11 glaciers   

冰河，冰川( glacier的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Glaciers gouged out valleys from the hills. 冰川把丘陵地带冲出一条条山谷。
• It has ice and snow glaciers, rainforests and beautiful mountains. 既有冰川，又有雨林和秀丽的山峰。 来自英语晨读30分（高一）

12 complicates   

使复杂化( complicate的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• What complicates the issue is the burden of history. 历史的重负使问题复杂化了。
• Russia as a great and ambitious power gravely complicates the situation. 俄国作为一个强大而有野心的国家，使得局势异常复杂。

13 stimulate   

vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋

参考例句：

• Your encouragement will stimulate me to further efforts.你的鼓励会激发我进一步努力。
• Success will stimulate the people for fresh efforts.成功能鼓舞人们去作新的努力。