[ti:Saving Small Fish as Big US River Dries Up] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]更多听力请访问51VOA.COM [00:02.04]On a recent afternoon, vehicles moved up and down the dry riverbed [00:07.38]of the Rio Grande River, near Albuquerque, New Mexico. [00:12.68]The drivers had a purpose. [00:14.62]They were biologists hoping to save as many endangered fish as they could [00:21.05]before the sun dried out shrinking puddles of water. [00:25.88]For the first time in 40 years, the river that forms the border of Texas and Mexico [00:31.98]went dry in Albuquerque last month. [00:36.16]And the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow is disappearing along with the water. [00:43.12]Summer storms have brought river waters back. [00:46.29]But, experts warn that drying this far north is a sign of an increasingly limited water supply. [00:54.12]They say that there might not be enough water to save the minnow [00:58.04]and to provide water to nearby farms and communities. [01:03.20]The minnow, a tiny native fish, lives in a small area of the 3000-kilometer-long river. [01:11.80]It has survived 100 years of habitat loss [01:15.47]as the water was moved, redirected, [01:19.33]and taken from Colorado to New Mexico, Texas, and northern Mexico. [01:27.04]In 1994, the U.S. government listed the Rio Grande silvery minnow as endangered. [01:34.44]Scientists, local officials, and environmental groups [01:38.36]have worked to keep the fish alive — [01:40.74]as required by the Endangered Species Act. [01:44.96]But their efforts have not been enough. [01:47.67]Years of drought, high temperatures, and an unpredictable rain [01:53.27]are destroying what remains of its habitat. Officials can do little. [02:00.28]U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist [02:03.39]Thomas Archdeacon leads a program to rescue the minnow. [02:08.88]He said, "When you have flow one day and no flow the next for miles, [02:14.92]the fish don't know how to get out of that." [02:19.16]When parts of the river dry out, officials use small nets [02:23.28]to pull fish from warm puddles and move them to still-flowing parts of the river. [02:30.00]The minnow's survival rate after being rescued is poor. [02:34.92]Only five percent survive the experience. [02:38.83]Still, leaving them in the puddles is a certain death sentence, Archdeacon said. [02:46.20]Over the years, the government has bred and released large numbers of silvery minnows. [02:52.92]But the fish need more water in the river to survive, officials say. [02:58.84]Historically, one way to raise water levels has been to release it from man-made lakes. [03:06.20]But this year, New Mexico has been unable to store extra water. [03:12.20]The state must send water to Texas as part of an agreement. [03:17.44]And the rainstorms in June were not enough to refill the river. [03:22.72]To keep more water in the Rio Grande, [03:25.24]the state is offering to pay farmers to leave fields unplanted. [03:30.72]But few have agreed. In one area, officials said only five percent was left unplanted this year. [03:39.36]"We need more people to do it," said Jason Casuga, [03:43.43]chief engineer for the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District. [03:48.40]But the program is just in its second year, and farmers want to grow crops, Casuga said. [03:56.16]For the past four years, Ron Moya has farmed about 20 hectares of land near Albuquerque. [04:03.72]A retired engineer, Moya said he now works on the same land [04:08.80]that generations of his family had farmed before him. [04:13.64]Last year, Moya left four hectares unplanted in exchange for several thousand dollars. [04:20.88]But he said he would not do it this year although he was offered more money. [04:26.44]That is because he wanted the moisture to keep the soil on his farm alive. [04:32.72]New Mexico's biggest city, Albuquerque, is also not likely to give up water. [04:39.36]Like other western U.S. areas, the city of 563,000 has greatly limited water usage, [04:47.91]from about 946 liters a day in 1994 to 450 liters in 2019. [04:57.48]Mike Hamman is New Mexico's state water engineer. [05:02.28]He said the state has already taken a lot of measures to save water. [05:07.51]"So now it gets a little harder," he said. [05:11.80]I'm Jill Robbins. 更多听力请访问51VOA.COM