百科知識視頻之煎蛋小學(xué)堂82 世界上比較大的生物

Blue whales are the biggest animals ever to exist on earth.They can weigh upwards of 150 tons,which is more than the largest dinosaurs!But the blue whale is not the biggest living thing.That title goes to...well,it depends on what you mean by"biggest"!The tallest may be a California redwood nicknamed"Hyperion",At a towering 115M,this giant is taller than the Statue of Liberty,The most extensive organism is a very old"humongous fungus" that covers a whopping 2,385 acres in a national forest in Oregon.

藍(lán)鯨是世界上存在的最大的動物。其體重最大可達(dá)150噸 比最大的恐龍還重要!但是藍(lán)鯨并非最大的生物。這個頭銜屬于...這取決于你是如何理解這個“最大!”最高也許是加尼福尼亞一棵名為“亥伯龍神”的紅杉。這棵樹高115米 比自由女神像還高，延伸面積最廣的生物是一株古老的巨型真菌，在俄勒岡一國家森林中 其覆蓋面積達(dá)到2385英畝。

At the base of the trees,bunches of "honey mushrooms"appear...They are the "fruiting bodies"produced by the fungus,which otherwise lives out of sight.imagine if apple trees grew underground and only the apples were visible to us!That's basically what the fungus does,except that it spreads its"mycelia"not just through the soil but also through the roots and bark of trees in the forest,attacking them and stealing their nutrients so it can continue spreading outwards.

在樹根處悄然出現(xiàn)幾簇“假蜜環(huán)菌”它們是真菌所產(chǎn)生的“子實(shí)體”，另外它們生活在人們的視野之外。想象一下 如果蘋果樹生長在地下 而我們能看到的只有蘋果!這就是這些真菌所做的，除了它不僅在通過土壤散播菌絲，還有森林中的樹根和樹皮，真菌攻擊它們 偷來養(yǎng)分以繼續(xù)向更遠(yuǎn)處傳播。

However,if we're talking about the good old heaviest organism ever found,that prize goes to a giant panda living high on a Utah plateau,Just kidding...It goes to a single quaking aspen named "Pando" that weighs over 6,000 tons-as much as forty blue whales.If you go to Fishlake National Forest,though,you won't see a giant tree trunk,you'll just see a forest of regular-sized trees.

不過 如果我們說的是有史以來找到最重的生物，這個獎項(xiàng)要屬于居住在猶他州高原上的巨型熊貓。逗你玩呢...這屬于一棵名叫“Pando”的山楊 其重量逾6000噸 和40條藍(lán)鯨一樣重。如果你去Fishlake國家森林，你看到的可不是一個大樹干，而是一整片正常大小的樹林。

But,thanks to genetic testing,we've learned that this stand of aspen covering 106 acres of land is actually a single clonal organism that grew from a lone seed long ago.That single tree was able to spread so much because its roots send up shoots that grow into what look like individual trees.Since all 47,000"trees"are apart of the same organism,the forest behaves somewhat unusually,for example,the entire forest transitions simultaneously from winter to spring and uses its vast network of roots to distribute water and nutrients from trees with plenty to trees in need.

不過 正由于基因檢測 我們發(fā)現(xiàn)這片覆蓋106英畝的山楊，實(shí)際上是由很長時間前的一粒種子無性繁殖出來的。那一棵樹擴(kuò)張得如此之廣，因?yàn)樗母鶗l(fā)生新芽 長出那些表面上獨(dú)立的樹。由于47000棵“樹”都是同一生物體的部分，這片森林表現(xiàn)出的行為也與眾不同，比如 整個森林在冬春交季時同時發(fā)生變化，并憑借其巨大的根莖網(wǎng)絡(luò)來從營養(yǎng)富足的樹向需養(yǎng)的樹輸送水和營養(yǎng)物質(zhì)。

Speaking of water... if you include water when weighing these giant organisms,then the humongous fungus might actually weigh more than Pando.But foresters,at least,care only about the mass actually produced during growth:the dry mass.And since fungi are mostly water Pando wins.

說到水 如果在稱這些巨型生物時算上水的重量，那么巨型真菌可能比Pandora還要重。但是護(hù)林人只在乎植物生長時增加的質(zhì)量：即“干質(zhì)量”由于真菌中大部分都是水分Pando獲勝。

Either way,it's likely that some of the belowground connections,whether roots or mycelia have become severed over time,meaning these giants are probably comprised of smaller,but still ginormous and genetically identical,patches.

無論如何 很可能某些深埋地下的聯(lián)系，無論是根還是菌絲 在某時曾經(jīng)斷裂，揭示出他們都是從小群體演化而來的，但它們?nèi)匀皇铸嫶?個體的基因仍相似。

And finally,because of the extensive testing required to confirm"biggest anything"claims,the fungus and aspen can only profess to be the largest living organisms ever found there may be even bigger monsters lurking right under our feet,just waiting to be discovered!

最終 由于確定“最大的物體”需要進(jìn)行大量的測試，真菌和山楊因而都只能被稱為目前已發(fā)現(xiàn)的最大生物體，也許更大的怪物中潛伏在我們腳下，就等著被我們發(fā)現(xiàn)!