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Alligator gar are the second largest freshwater fish in North America,
鳄雀鳝是北美第二大淡水鱼，
they disappeared from Illinois' waterways in the 1990s.
但从20世纪90年代起，伊利诺伊河道就再也没见过它们。
We want to restore that part of the ecosystem
我们想要恢复这部分生态系统，
because it is important to have top predators to balance the species below them
因为让顶级捕食者来保持其下面物种的平衡十分重要，
in order to keep check on some more abundant species.
了解哪些是过剩物种。
Fisheries biologist Randy Sauer says beyond that,
渔业生物学家兰迪·萨尔表示，
alligator gar make for some great big game fishing.
除上述原因之外，鳄雀鳝在一些大型钓鱼比赛中也不可或缺。
The diamond-scaled animals, which can breathe both air and water,
这种动物有菱形鳞片，水陆两栖，
can grow up to 2.7 meters and weigh more than 136 kilograms.
且最多可达到2.7米长，136公斤重。
In fact, their large size is what did them in originally in the state.
事实上，鳄雀鳝最早之所以能在伊利诺伊站稳脚跟，与它们的大个头有着密不可分的联系。
It was pretty much extirpated from a lot of trench because of misconceptions about it eating sport fish.
当时许多海沟中的鳄雀鳝几乎都遭到了灭顶之灾，因为人们对食用垂钓鱼产生了错误的看法。
And people would target it and literally put bounties and capture these fish.
所以将目光对准了它们，甚至还针对捕杀鳄雀鳝的行为出台了奖励措施。
The alligator gar is an opportunistic feeder, meaning it will eat whatever it encounters,
鳄雀鳝是个机会主义捕食者，几乎什么都吃，
from an occasional turtle or small duck to invasive species such as Asian and silver carp.
从偶尔出现的海龟或者小鸭子，到亚洲鲤鱼和鲢鱼等入侵物种统统不放过。
Sauer hopes the reintroduction program will help the state's efforts to control the carp.
萨尔希望通过重新引进鳄雀鳝的计划，为伊利诺伊州控制鲤鱼的工作贡献一份力量。
Because gar can live up to 60 years, this program is going to take many years to fully expand.
由于鳄雀鳝最多能活60年，因此该计划未来还得花上很多年才能够完全展开。
The alligator gar doesn't sexually mature to females till 11 years, and the males not till 6 or 7 years.
雌性鳄雀鳝到11岁时性成熟，雄性鱼则是6岁或7岁成熟。
So at the outset of this project we're probably going to stock more heavily than we will 10 or 20 years down the road
所以在项目开始时，考虑到未来十年甚至二十年的情况，我们会投放更多的鳄雀鳝，
when hopefully these fish will find each other and start doing the job on their own.
希望它们能够自行繁殖。
To date, 7,000 alligator gar have been fitted with transponder tags
到目前为止，工作人员已经在7000条鳄雀鳝的身上安装了微型追踪器，
so that they can be tracked and then released into Illinois waterways.
方便日后跟踪进展，并将它们放入了伊利诺伊各河道当中。
As it rains and floods, biologists expect some of the fish to follow the rivers all the way down to Louisiana and Texas.
随着雨水和洪水的冲洗，生物学家预计会有一部分鳄雀鳝沿着河流一路游到路易斯安那和德克萨斯州。
For VOA news, I'm Erika Celeste in the Kaskaskia River State Fish and Wildlife Area.
VOA新闻，艾瑞卡·西莱斯特在卡斯卡斯基亚河州立鱼类和动物保护区为您报道。
