It lives in south-central Utah. And it’s huge. In fact, it is thought to be the largest living thing on the planet. It’s a stand of trees, a field of aspens all clones and all connected at the roots. Called Pando, the grove was first characterized by scientists in the 1970s, and it’s probably existed for many thousands of years. But now a study finds that this this massive, ancient organism is failing.

它住在犹他州中南部。这是巨大的。事实上，它被认为是地球上最大的生物。这是一个树木的立场，一个白杨树的所有克隆领域，所有克隆都在根部连接。被称为Pando的树林在20世纪70年代首次被科学家所描述，并且它可能存在了数千年。但现在一项研究发现，这个庞大的古老生物体正在失败。

“More than 80% of the entire Pando clone is in a non-sustainable state that has the potential to collapse and significantly reduce the size of this world’s largest organism in the next 10-to-20 years.” Paul Rogers, Director of the Western Aspen Alliance at Utah State University.

“整个Pando克隆的80％以上处于不可持续的状态，有可能在未来10到20年内崩溃并显着减少这个世界上最大的有机体的大小。”Paul Rogers，犹他州立大学西部阿斯彭联盟。

The cause of this crisis? Herbivores, mostly deer. Parts of Pando are fenced off, but that section is still under attack. “Young aspen trees are so nutritious that animals really want to get them, particularly late in the year when the rest of the forest plants are senest and dried up...I think that there’s perhaps some very healthy [animals] are able to jump over the eight-foot fence.”

这场危机的原因是什么？草食动物，主要是鹿。 Pando的部分被围起来，但该部分仍然受到攻击。 “年轻的白杨树非常有营养，动物真的很想得到它们，特别是在其他森林植物干枯的一年中的晚些时候......我想也许有些非常健康的[动物]能够跳跃在八英尺高的围栏上。“

The deers’ aggressive browsing of young aspen poses a huge threat to Pando. “We see a big gap in the demography. And I often use the human analogy that this is a forest that is almost completely composed of senior citizens, and we have no mature, healthy individuals, we have no middle aged, we have no teenagers, we have no babies. And that’s a really dangerous situation for aspen because it really depends on continuous growth of the whole clone. You should have a really diverse age and height structure.”

鹿对年轻白杨的侵略性浏览对潘多造成了巨大威胁。 “我们看到人口统计学上存在很大差距。而且我经常使用人类的比喻，这是一个几乎完全由老年人组成的森林，我们没有成熟，健康的人，我们没有中年人，我们没有青少年，我们没有婴儿。这对白杨来说是一个非常危险的情况，因为它真的取决于整个克隆的持续增长。你应该有一个非常多样化的年龄和身高结构。“

The problem has largely been created by humans and our game management strategies. Rogers says those strategies need to be reconsidered if we want to protect Pando. And it’s not just about saving the world’s largest organism for its own sake.

问题主要是由人类和我们的游戏管理策略造成的。罗杰斯说，如果我们想要保护潘多，那么需要重新考虑这些策略。而且这不仅仅是为了拯救这个世界上最大的有机体。

“Aspen here and, in fact, worldwide harbor great amounts of biodiversity… hundreds of plants and animals that are dependent on aspen ecosystems. In the Western U.S., the lower 48, aspen, second to riparian systems, are the most biodiverse forests that we have. Another term for that is Aspen is a keystone species. So as aspen goes so do all those dependent species. So that’s the number one reason.

“阿斯彭在这里，事实上，世界范围内拥有大量的生物多样性......数百种依赖于白杨生态系统的植物和动物。在美国西部，较低的48，白杨，仅次于河岸系统，是我们拥有的最具生物多样性的森林。另一个术语是Aspen是一个关键物种。所以那些依赖的物种就像阿斯彭一样。所以这是最重要的原因。

“Specific to Pando, this closely demarcated 106 acres or 43 hectares is something that’s workable that we can see and feel and look at and people know about or are learning more about. And so…as a conservation symbol it’s like, if we can’t fix this one thing that has this international reputation, what does that say about our greater relationships with the Earth and living compatibly with the planet?”

“具体到Pando，这个占地面积106英亩或43公顷的土地是可行的，我们可以看到，感受和看到，人们知道或正在了解更多。所以...作为一种保护符号就像是，如果我们无法解决这一具有这种国际声誉的事情，那么这与我们与地球的更大关系以及与地球兼容生活有何意义？“

—Annie Sneed

(The above text is a transcript of this podcast)