Giant Chocolate Industry Depends on Tiny Insects for Survival

⊙ By Stephen Schmidt

翻譯：Billybudd

閱讀指南針

這是一篇介紹科研成果的短文，這類文章的標題旨在把科研最重要的成果表達清楚，所以通常比記敘文和議論文更直接、更務實，因而它是我們閱讀此類文章時要抓住的關鍵。

閱讀本文時，按標題的提示應搞清楚兩個問題：一是巧克力產業的生存為何依賴于昆蟲，二是昆蟲究竟是如何助巧克力產業一臂之力的。

學習步驟：

1. 通讀。借助單詞注釋，通讀全文，熟悉大概內容，看自己能否大致上回答上面提到的第一個問題。遇到不理解的復雜句子可先跳過，以掌握文章大意為主。

2. 精讀第一步——求解。對文章大意有個初步了解后，逐句閱讀，力求弄明白每一句的意思。對于在理解上有困難的詞組、句子，多查不同的辭典，請求同學和老師的幫助。

3. 精讀第二步——提煉。文章標題籠統提及insects，其實正文只介紹了作用各不相同的兩種昆蟲。第3—7段和第8—11段分別講述了兩種昆蟲與巧克力的關系，反復細讀兩種昆蟲所起作用的具體細節，找出關鍵詞，并用一兩句話分別復述兩種昆蟲的大致作用。

4. 閱讀全文。這一次，看自己在理解上與第一次相比有多少提高。

Chocolate is a global industry worth about $100 billion a year. What gets overshadowed[使失色]in all those sweet treats and big profits are the bugs[小蟲]responsible for it all.

Yes, bugs.

Chocolate comes from cacao[可可]beans, which come from the tiny flower of the cacao plant. Those plants are pollinated[授粉]by even smaller flies called biting midges[蠓]. For years, the flies have been the focal[重要的]point of research by Samantha Jay Forbes, a doctoral candidate[博士生]in agriculture and environment at James Cook University in Australia.

“They’ve got all these cute little hairs on their back,” Forbes says. “So, while they’re foraging[覓食]inside the flower, they are collecting all of this pollen[花粉]on their thorax[胸部]or on their back, and then they fly into another flower and try and access the internal[內部的]parts of the flower; all of the pollen on their back gets transferred[轉移]to the receptive[接受的]female part of the flower.”

One grain of pollen translates[轉變]into one cacao bean, she says.

Forbes spends many hours out in the field[田野]observing cacao flowers and midges. She says that a single cacao tree has the ability to produce more than 124,000 flowers in a season.

“We don’t like midges and then you realize that we wouldn’t have chocolate without them because we’d have no pollination services,” Forbes says. “I think you develop an appreciation for these small little flies and that huge role that they have in our societies.”

Stacy Philpott says don’t forget about the army ants[行軍蟻]as well.Philpott, an agroecologist[農業生態學家]at the University of California, Santa Cruz,says that the ants serve a vital role on both cacao and coffee plantations[種植園].

The ants—which have about 200 different species of army units found

in Africa, Central America and South America—are carnivorous[肉食性的]. They can eat other insects or even something as large as a reptile.

“When the army ant colony[群]starts moving through the habitat, it chases[驅逐]away almost every living thing in its pathway,” Philpott says. “So, these colonies can have up to 20 million individuals in an army ant colony; when they’re going through the agroforest[混農林], they go up onto the cacao trees and the trees almost turn black because they have so many ants on them.”

In addition to eating pest insects around the plants, the ants also attract birds that provide pest control through their appetites[食欲]. There are 15 species of birds that will always follow the army ants and another 50 species that will occasionally do so, Philpott says.

So next time when you have a bite of chocolate, don’t forget it’s partly brought to you by insects.

詞匯學習：translate

對于translate一詞，我們最熟悉的含義莫過于“翻譯”了；閱讀量大的同學可能會知道它的另一層含義，即“用簡單的語言說明”，如用通俗易懂的語言解釋深奧的科學原理等。其實，translate還有另一個含義，即“把……變成”，本文中的“one grain of pollen translates into one cacao bean”要表達的是“每粒花粉會變成一顆咖啡豆”。這個用法既可指人，也可指物。例如：

● The book was translated from Spanish.（這本書是從西班牙語翻譯過來的。）

● The principle of relativity can be translated into simpler terms.（相對論的原理能用較為簡單的語言加以說明。）

● She was quickly translating herself into a full-time housewife.（她正迅速地變成一位全職家庭主婦。）

參考譯文

巧克力是一個全球性產業，年市值高約1000億美元，而這甜蜜美食與它帶來的巨大利潤卻讓在其中居功至偉的小蟲子顯得無足輕重。

沒錯，蟲子。

巧克力來自可可豆，后者則是可可樹上的小花結的果實。這些小花的授粉是由蠓這種體型比可可豆更小的飛蟲來完成的。多年來，這些小飛蟲一直是薩曼莎·杰伊·福布斯的重點研究對象，她是澳大利亞詹姆斯·庫克大學農業與環境專業的博士生。

“它們的背部長滿了可愛的小絨毛，”福布斯解釋道。“因此，它們在花朵里面覓食的同時，也在用自己的胸部或背部收集花粉。然后它們會飛進另一朵花里，接觸到這朵花的內部，這時候，它們背上攜帶的全部花粉就會轉移到這朵花里負責接收花粉的雌蕊上。”

她說，每粒花粉最終都會變成一顆可可豆。

福布斯在野外花費了大量時間觀察可可花跟蠓的活動。她說，一棵可可樹一季就能開出12.4萬多朵花。

“沒有人喜歡蠓，可是你會發現，要是沒有了它們，我們就不會有巧克力，因為沒有了它們，可可花的授粉過程就無法實現，”福布斯說。“這時候你就會對這種小蟲子，以及它們在人類社會中扮演的重要角色油然生出一種感激之情。”

加州大學圣克魯茲分校的農業生態學家斯泰茜·菲爾波特則提醒大家，不要忘記行軍蟻的功勞。她說，行軍蟻也在可可跟咖啡種植園里扮演著至關重要的角色。

目前在非洲、中美洲及南美洲地區發現的行軍蟻物種約有200個。這些螞蟻屬食肉性動物，它們的食物包括其他昆蟲，甚至連爬行動物那么大的生物都不在話下。

“當行軍蟻的蟻群在棲息地內移動時，幾乎所有擋道的活物都會遭到驅趕，”菲爾波特說。“這些螞蟻的單個蟻群規模多達2000萬只。它們在混農林活動時，會爬上可可樹—樹上的螞蟻數量之多，幾乎把這些樹變成了黑色。”

除了消滅可可樹周圍的害蟲之外，行軍蟻還能吸引各種鳥類，后者的捕食行為也能達到防治害蟲的目的。菲爾波特稱，總是跟隨行軍蟻移動的鳥類多達15種，偶爾為之的則有50種。

因此，下一次你吃一口巧克力的時候，別忘了這可是昆蟲的功勞哦。