人们要细心保护稀有物种

Sheila Conant: Hawaii is unique in its rate of what we call endemism. And that is the existence of species that occur in Hawaii and they occur nowhere else in the world.

希拉．柯南特：夏威夷的独特性体现在物种的特有分布率，即夏威夷存在的物种是世界其他任何地区所没有的。

You are listening to Sheila Conant, a zoologist and conservationist at the University of Hawaii. She said Hawaii is the most isolated landmass in the world – and the protected conditions have allowed thousands of unique species to evolve and flourish. But she said many of these species have now become extinct or endangered.

您正在收听对希拉．柯南特的采访。她是夏威夷大学的动物学家和环保人士。她说夏威夷是一块与世隔离的大陆，为成千上万的稀有物种提供安全的环境，促使它们进化和繁衍生长。

Sheila Conant: We’ve had twenty more extinctions than New Zealand, and greater than fifty more than North America.

希拉．柯南特：夏威夷的物种灭绝的数目比新西兰高出20多种，比北美高出50多种。

She said a major cause of the extinctions are plants and animals not native to Hawaii. These invasive species – brought to the island by people – have no natural predators. And, she said, the loss of one species can have a ripple effect on other species in the ecosystem.

她说非夏威夷本土的动植物引入是促使物种灭绝的主要原因。这些由当地人引进的入侵物种没有天敌。并且，某种物种的灭绝会对生态系统中的其他物种带来连锁反应。

Sheila Conant: We used to have birds that pollinated specific species of plants, and some of those plants have become very rare because their pollinators have become extinct.
希拉．柯南特：曾经会有某些鸟类给一些植物授粉，但是当这种鸟类灭绝后这些植物也变得越来越稀少。

Conant said invasive species are a worldwide problem. She’s working to preserve Hawaii’s native species by creating areas that are cleared of these species’ non-native predators. Our thanks today to NOAA Pacific Services.

柯南特说入侵物种是一个世界性的问题。她在努力创造保护区，摆脱这些非本土的捕食者的影响，以保护夏威夷原生的物种。