新西兰英语 740 Great Bunny Hunt

 　　For the last 23 years, hunters have been invited to shoot rabbits on Good Friday in Central Otago. This is a 24 hour event, starting at 9am on Friday. The dead rabbits are counted on Saturday. This year 18,027 rabbits were killed. The record was in 2011 with nearly 23,000 rabbits. Last year the number was only 10,424. Because of the drought¹ this year, there is less tussock grass where rabbits can hide. However, because it was nearly full moon – and rabbits are shy of moonlight – it was still difficult to find the rabbits.

　　The hunters came from all parts of New Zealand and even from Australia. They work in teams of 12, spread out across a field, with some of the team behind to pick up the dead rabbits. This year 59 teams applied² but only 37 farms were available. Names of teams were chosen by ballot³ 4 weeks ago. On Friday morning, teams and farms were chosen by ballot – some farms have more rabbits than others.

　　This was a fund-raising event. Money raised is for a CT scanner at the local hospital.

　　Rabbits are a huge problem in parts of New Zealand, especially Central Otago.

　　Vocabulary

　　?Bunny – children’s word for rabbit. The title is an ironic⁴ reference⁵ to the Easter Bunny (chocolate bunnies).

　　?drought –no rain for a long time

　　?tussock – brown grass

　　Click⁶ here to see a picture of tussock.

　　?shy – afraid

　　?ballot – all names put in a hat and someone pulls out each name (e.g. 59 names in the hat and 37 pulled out)

　　?fund-raising – to raise (get) money. Note idiom – to raise money

　　?CT scanner – a large machine which uses X-rays to produce 3D images

　　Questions

　　1.Why are rabbits a problem on farms?

　　2.What are other ways to kill rabbits? How successful are these methods? Are they cruel i.e. do the rabbits suffer before they die?

　　3.Rabbits are not native to New Zealand. Why did 19th century Europeans bring rabbits here?

1 drought   

n.旱灾，干旱，久旱

参考例句：

• The plants are growing in again,despite the drought.尽管干旱，植物又长出来了。
• The ground is as hard as stone after the drought.长期干旱后土地硬得就像石头一样。

2 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

3 ballot   

n.（不记名）投票，投票总数，投票权；vi.投票

参考例句：

• The members have demanded a ballot.会员们要求投票表决。
• The union said they will ballot members on whether to strike.工会称他们将要求会员投票表决是否罢工。

4 ironic   

adj.讽刺的，有讽刺意味的，出乎意料的

参考例句：

• That is a summary and ironic end.那是一个具有概括性和讽刺意味的结局。
• People used to call me Mr Popularity at high school,but they were being ironic.人们中学时常把我称作“万人迷先生”，但他们是在挖苦我。

5 reference   

n.提到，说到，暗示，查看，查阅

参考例句：

• We spent days going through all related reference material.我们花了好多天功夫查阅所有有关的参考资料。
• I like to have my reference books within my reach.我喜欢把参考书放到伸手可取的地方。

6 click   

n.点击，滴答声，拍答声；v.点击，作滴答声，使...作拍答声

参考例句：

• Click the Allow button on the yellow bar.点击黄色栏中的允许按钮。
• Click on the links for each city for a detailed map.点击连接看城市地区详细地图。