Giant Chocolate Industry Depends on Tiny Insects for Survival

⊙ By Stephen Schmidt

翻译：Billybudd

阅读指南针

这是一篇介绍科研成果的短文，这类文章的标题旨在把科研最重要的成果表达清楚，所以通常比记叙文和议论文更直接、更务实，因而它是我们阅读此类文章时要抓住的关键。

阅读本文时，按标题的提示应搞清楚两个问题：一是巧克力产业的生存为何依赖于昆虫，二是昆虫究竟是如何助巧克力产业一臂之力的。

学习步骤：

1. 通读。借助单词注释，通读全文，熟悉大概内容，看自己能否大致上回答上面提到的第一个问题。遇到不理解的复杂句子可先跳过，以掌握文章大意为主。

2. 精读第一步——求解。对文章大意有个初步了解后，逐句阅读，力求弄明白每一句的意思。对于在理解上有困难的词组、句子，多查不同的辞典，请求同学和老师的帮助。

3. 精读第二步——提炼。文章标题笼统提及insects，其实正文只介绍了作用各不相同的两种昆虫。第3—7段和第8—11段分别讲述了两种昆虫与巧克力的关系，反复细读两种昆虫所起作用的具体细节，找出关键词，并用一两句话分别复述两种昆虫的大致作用。

4. 阅读全文。这一次，看自己在理解上与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[小虫]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[觅食]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[内部的]parts of the flower; all of the pollen on their back gets transferred[转移]to the receptive[接受的]female part of the flower.”

One grain of pollen translates[转变]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[行军蚁]as well.Philpott, an agroecologist[农业生态学家]at the University of California, Santa Cruz,says that the ants serve a vital role on both cacao and coffee plantations[种植园].

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[驱逐]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[混农林], 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.

词汇学习：translate

对于translate一词，我们最熟悉的含义莫过于“翻译”了；阅读量大的同学可能会知道它的另一层含义，即“用简单的语言说明”，如用通俗易懂的语言解释深奥的科学原理等。其实，translate还有另一个含义，即“把……变成”，本文中的“one grain of pollen translates into one cacao bean”要表达的是“每粒花粉会变成一颗咖啡豆”。这个用法既可指人，也可指物。例如：

● The book was translated from Spanish.（这本书是从西班牙语翻译过来的。）

● The principle of relativity can be translated into simpler terms.（相对论的原理能用较为简单的语言加以说明。）

● She was quickly translating herself into a full-time housewife.（她正迅速地变成一位全职家庭主妇。）

参考译文

巧克力是一个全球性产业，年市值高约1000亿美元，而这甜蜜美食与它带来的巨大利润却让在其中居功至伟的小虫子显得无足轻重。

没错，虫子。

巧克力来自可可豆，后者则是可可树上的小花结的果实。这些小花的授粉是由蠓这种体型比可可豆更小的飞虫来完成的。多年来，这些小飞虫一直是萨曼莎·杰伊·福布斯的重点研究对象，她是澳大利亚詹姆斯·库克大学农业与环境专业的博士生。

“它们的背部长满了可爱的小绒毛，”福布斯解释道。“因此，它们在花朵里面觅食的同时，也在用自己的胸部或背部收集花粉。然后它们会飞进另一朵花里，接触到这朵花的内部，这时候，它们背上携带的全部花粉就会转移到这朵花里负责接收花粉的雌蕊上。”

她说，每粒花粉最终都会变成一颗可可豆。

福布斯在野外花费了大量时间观察可可花跟蠓的活动。她说，一棵可可树一季就能开出12.4万多朵花。

“没有人喜欢蠓，可是你会发现，要是没有了它们，我们就不会有巧克力，因为没有了它们，可可花的授粉过程就无法实现，”福布斯说。“这时候你就会对这种小虫子，以及它们在人类社会中扮演的重要角色油然生出一种感激之情。”

加州大学圣克鲁兹分校的农业生态学家斯泰茜·菲尔波特则提醒大家，不要忘记行军蚁的功劳。她说，行军蚁也在可可跟咖啡种植园里扮演着至关重要的角色。

目前在非洲、中美洲及南美洲地区发现的行军蚁物种约有200个。这些蚂蚁属食肉性动物，它们的食物包括其他昆虫，甚至连爬行动物那么大的生物都不在话下。

“当行军蚁的蚁群在栖息地内移动时，几乎所有挡道的活物都会遭到驱赶，”菲尔波特说。“这些蚂蚁的单个蚁群规模多达2000万只。它们在混农林活动时，会爬上可可树—树上的蚂蚁数量之多，几乎把这些树变成了黑色。”

除了消灭可可树周围的害虫之外，行军蚁还能吸引各种鸟类，后者的捕食行为也能达到防治害虫的目的。菲尔波特称，总是跟随行军蚁移动的鸟类多达15种，偶尔为之的则有50种。

因此，下一次你吃一口巧克力的时候，别忘了这可是昆虫的功劳哦。