国家地理 牧野分歧(4)

Gerrity estimates the total cost to buy 500,000 acres of private land and endow it forever will be upwards¹ of $500 million -- half the price of a professional football stadium, which has a rough shelf life of 20 to 30 years. From 2009 to 2017 alone, more than a million acres of native prairie were converted to cropland in the seven counties surrounding APR.

格里蒂估计，要购买并永久占有50万英亩的私人领地，总共要花费5亿美金--一座专业足球场价格的一半，而且足球场的使用年限大约是20到30年。仅在2009年到2017年间，美国草原保护区周围7个县超过一百万英亩的草场就变成了耕地。

"Species are blinking out," he says. "Habitat is going away. There's a really short period, maybe 20 to 30 years, to do some really big stuff, and then the opportunity is going to be gone. We're swinging for the fences here."

他说：“物种正在消失。栖息地也正在消失。可以做一些大事的时间很短，可能只有二十到三十年，然后机会就消失了。我们正在因为这些栅栏付出代价。”

It's an audacious vision. It is also a very contentious² one.

这是一个大胆的预测。它也同样充满争议。

When it rains in central Montana, the dirt roads turn into what the locals call "gumbo," a slick clay-mud that often is impassable. It is, mercifully, drying out as Leah LaTray steers³ her pickup⁴ down a track snaked with deep ruts, clods of mud winging out from the wheels. LaTray's great-grandfather, Mose LaTreille, was a cowboy of French and Native American heritage who came with the cattle to northern Montana in the 1870s. LaTray, 47, wears a long black braid over her shoulder, silver hoop⁵ earrings⁶, vest and kerchief, and square-toed cowboy boots. Her parents lost their ranch⁷ when she was a girl; she left Montana in the 1990s to study microbiology in Seattle and then to train horses in Texas. "It took me 20 years to come back," she says, "but I did," buying 250 acres that remained in her family's hands. LaTray makes her living running cattle on her partner's property now. "If you sell your land, you sell your future," she says.

蒙大拿州中部下雨的时候，布满尘土的路面就会变成当地人口中的gumbo，意思是湿滑的无法通过的路。好在莉亚·拉特雷把皮卡开上布满车辙的小路时，路面已经干了，土块从轮子里滚出来。拉特里的曾祖父摩西·拉特雷是法国和美国土著的混血，也是一个牛仔。19世纪70年代，他骑着牛来到蒙大拿州的北部。拉特雷现在47岁，肩上垂着一条又黑又长的辫子，戴着银色的圆圈耳环，穿着背心，拿着手帕，脚上是方头牛仔靴。当她还是个小姑娘的时候，她的父母失去了牧场；20世纪90年代，她离开了蒙大拿州，到西雅图去学习微生物学，然后到了德克萨斯州驯马。她说：“我花了二十年才回来。但我做到了。”拉特雷父母的250英亩的地被人买走，她靠在伙伴的草场上牧牛维生。“如果你卖掉自己的土地，你就卖掉了自己的未来。”她说。

1 upwards   

adv.向上，在更高处...以上

参考例句：

• The trend of prices is still upwards.物价的趋向是仍在上涨。
• The smoke rose straight upwards.烟一直向上升。

2 contentious   

adj.好辩的，善争吵的

参考例句：

• She was really not of the contentious fighting sort.她委实不是好吵好闹的人。
• Since then they have tended to steer clear of contentious issues.从那时起，他们总想方设法避开有争议的问题。

3 steers   

n.阉公牛，肉用公牛( steer的名词复数 )v.驾驶( steer的第三人称单数 )；操纵；控制；引导

参考例句：

• This car steers easily. 这部车子易于驾驶。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Good fodder fleshed the steers up. 优质饲料使菜牛长肉。 来自辞典例句

4 pickup   

n.拾起，获得

参考例句：

• I would love to trade this car for a pickup truck.我愿意用这辆汽车换一辆小型轻便卡车。||The luck guy is a choice pickup for the girls.那位幸运的男孩是女孩子们想勾搭上的人。

5 hoop   

n.（篮球）篮圈，篮

参考例句：

• The child was rolling a hoop.那个孩子在滚铁环。
• The wooden tub is fitted with the iron hoop.木盆都用铁箍箍紧。

6 earrings   

n.耳环( earring的名词复数 )；耳坠子

参考例句：

• a pair of earrings 一对耳环
• These earrings snap on with special fastener. 这付耳环是用特制的按扣扣上去的。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 ranch   

n.大牧场，大农场

参考例句：

• He went to work on a ranch.他去一个大农场干活。
• The ranch is in the middle of a large plateau.该牧场位于一个辽阔高原的中部。