考满分网

Part A:

Good morning.

早上好。

Today I'd like to present the findings of our Year 2 project on wild life found in gardens throughout our city.

今天，我想介绍一下我们城市中的两年项目在花园中发现的野生动植物的研究结果。

I'll start by saying something about the background to the project, then talk a little bit about our research techniques, and then indicate some of our interim findings.

我想先介绍些关于这个项目的背景，然后再谈一点我们的研究方法，然后指出一些我们的中期发现。

First of all, how did we choose our topic?

首先，我们是如何选择我们的话题的呢?

Well, there are four of us in the group and one day while we ere discussing a possible focus, two of the group mentioned that they had seen yet more sparrow-hawks-one of Britain's most interesting birds of prey - in their own city centre gardens and wondered why they were turning up in these gardens in great numbers.

嗯，我们的小组中有四个人，一天，当我们讨论一个可能的重点时，小组中的两个人提到，他们已经没有再看到更多的麻雀——老鹰——英国最有趣的鸟类的猎物——在他们自己的城市中心花园，并想知道为什么他们在这些花园中会大量出现。

We were all very engaged by the idea of why wild animals would choose to inhabit a city garden.

关于为什么野生动物会选择住在城市花园的这个想法，使我们去年都非常忙碌

Why is it so popular with wildlife when the countryside itself is becoming less so?

为什么农村变得越来越少的时候，野生动物却如此的受欢迎呢?

The first thing we did was to establish what proportion of the urban land is taken up by private gardens.

我们所做的第一件事就是建立由私人花园占用的比例的城市土地。

We estimated that it was about one fifth, and this was endorsed by looking at large-scale usage maps in the town land survey office- 24% to be precise.

我们估计，它是五分之一左右，这是通过查看在镇上的土地调查办公室大规模使用的地图的而得到的结果——准确来讲是24％。

Our own informal discussions with neighbours and friends led us to believe that many garden owners had interesting experiences to relate regarding wild animal sightings so we decided to survey garden owners from different areas of the city.

我们自己与邻居和朋友的非正式讨论让我们相信许多花园的业主有有趣的经历讲述关于野生动物的踪迹，我们决定从城市的不同地区开始调查花园业主。

Just over 100 of them completed a survey once every two weeks for twelve months-ticking off species they had seen from a pro forma list-and adding the names of any rarer ones.

他们中超过100人用了12个月的时间完成了一项每两周一次的调查——列举出他们从形式上的列表中看到的物种——给稀奇的物种添上名字。

Meanwhile, we were doing our own observations in selected gardens throughout the city.

同时，我们在整个城市中选出的花园里做我们自己的观察。

We deliberately choose smaller ones because they were by far the most typical in the city.

我们故意选择较小的，因为他们是城市中迄今为止最典型的花园。

The whole point of the project was to look at the norm not the exception.

该项目的全部要点是观测规范的物种，而不是例外的那些。

Alongside this primary research on urban gardens, we were studying a lot of books about the decline of wild animals in the countryside and thinking of possible causes for this.

除了城市花园这一初步研究，我们正在研究大量的书籍，关于农村的野生动物的下降，并思考这个问题可能的原因。

So what did we find?

我们都发现了什么呢?

Well, so much that I just won't have time to tell you about here.

嗯，发现太多了，我只是没有时间在这里告诉你。

If you're interested in reading our more comprehensive findings, we've produced detailed graphic representations on the college web-site and of course any of the group would be happy to talk to you about them.

如果您有兴趣阅读我们更全面的调查结果，我们已经在大学的网站上制作了详细的图形来呈现，当然了，小组中的每个人也将很高兴与您探讨他们。

Just email us.

只需给我们发电子邮件即可。

What we've decided to present today is information about just three species-because we felt these gave a good indication of the processes at work in rural and urban settings as a whole.

我们决定今天讲述关于三个物种的信息——因为我们觉得这是一个很好的象征，把农村和城市的工作流程作为一个整体。

Part B:

The first species to generate a lot of interesting information was frogs.

第一个产生很多有趣的信息的物种是青蛙。

And there was a clear pattern here-they proliferate where there is suitable water.

这里有一个清晰的模式，只要在那里有合适的水，它们就会在那里繁殖。

Garden ponds are on the increase, rural ponds are disappearing, leading to massive migration to the towns.

花园池塘的增加，农村池塘正在消失，导致青蛙大规模迁移到城镇。

Hedgehogs are also finding it easier to live in urban areas-this time because their predators are not finding it quite so attractive to leave their rural environment, so hedgehogs have a better survival rate in cities.

刺猬也可以很容易生活在城市地区——这一次是因为他们的天敌没觉得它很有吸引力而离开农村的环境．所以刺猬在城市中有更好的存活机率。

We had lots of sightings, so all in all we had no difficulties with our efforts to count their numbers precisely.

我们有很多的眼线，所以总之我们在计算它们的数量方面没有困难。

Our final species is the finest of bird singers, the song thrush.

我们的最后一个物种是唱歌最好的乌，画眉乌。

On the decline in the countryside, they are experiencing a resurgence in urban gardens because these days gardens are buying lots of different plants which means there's an extensive range of seeds around, which is what they feed on.

在农村数量下降的过程中，他们正在城市花园中复苏，因为近日园丁买了很多不同的植物，这意味着周围会有很多的种子，这是他们的饲料。

Another factor is the provision of nesting places-which is actually better in gardens than the countryside.

另一个因素是筑巢地点的提供——这实际上是在花园比农村好。

Hard to believe it, but it's true.

尽管让人很难相信，但这是真的。

Incidentally, we discovered that a massive new survey on song thrushes is about to be launched, so you should keep an eye open for that.

顺便说一句，我们发现，关于画眉鸟的大规模调查即将展开，所以你可以留心一下。

Now, I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have....

现在，我很乐意回答你的任何问题……