British farmers are being forced to adapt to a changing climate 氣候變暖迫使英國農民改變耕作方式

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Growing crops without water is impossible, but too much rain creates problems too.

在沒有水的情況下種植作物是不可能的，但雨水過多也會帶來問題。

Eleanor Gilbert is from a farming family in Berkshire, and is learning to work in a changing climate.

埃莉諾·吉爾伯特來自英格蘭伯克郡的一個農民傢庭，她在學習如何在不斷變暖的氣候中耕作。

Eleanor Gilbert, Farmer
“This morning, because the Sun is finally shining, we’re off to combine some oilseed rape.”

埃莉諾·吉爾伯特農民
“今天早上因為太陽終於出來瞭，所以我們準備去收割油菜。”

After a July dominated by rain, she’s making the most of a break in the weather – to harvest crops that ideally should no longer be in the ground.

在經歷瞭一個雨水連連的七月後，她充分利用起這難得一見的晴天去收割作物，在理想的情況下，這些作物應該早已經被收割。

Eleanor is working with her younger sister, Lucy, to bring in the rapeseed. Such is the pressure to finish the job before the rain starts again, that they’d been working late into the night.

埃莉諾正與妹妹露西一起收割油菜。想趕在再次下雨前幹完活的壓力很大，所以她們得工作到深夜。

But the crop is still too moist, and warm air has to be pumped through it on the floor of this store to try and make it dry enough to be sold.

但收上來的油菜籽還是太潮濕，必須要通過倉庫地面吹出的暖氣把它們吹得足夠幹才能出售。

Eleanor Gilbert, Farmer
“If we send it off [with] higher than a 15% moisture content, we’ll get rejections and also fines. The best way to tell… farmers like to bite. You can tell.”

埃莉諾·吉爾伯特農民
“如果我們賣出的油菜籽水分含量超過15%，就會被拒收，還會面臨罰款。檢查水分含量的最好方法，對於農民來說，就是口感，咬一口就知道瞭。”

AYYBLOG Reporter
“You can tell there’s too much moisture?”

AYYBLOG通訊員
“這樣你就能知道油菜籽太潮濕嗎？”

Eleanor Gilbert, Farmer
“Yeah, you can.”

埃莉諾·吉爾伯特農民
“是的，能知道。”

In North Herefordshire, it’s time to pick the blackcurrants for a well-known cordial. It rained a lot here in July too, but that’s not the biggest problem. Blackcurrants are a sensitive bunch, and last winter, there just weren’t enough cold days.

在英格蘭北赫裡福德郡，現在正值采摘用來釀造一種著名甜果汁飲料的黑加侖的季節。七月這裡也下瞭很多雨，但雨水過多還不是種植戶面臨的最大問題。黑加侖是一種對生長環境要求很高的植物，而去年冬天，寒冷的天氣不夠多。

Jo Hilditch, Blackcurrant grower
“It means that we’ve got this very uneven bud break, we’ve got uneven flowering, and we’ve got a very uneven harvest. There will be some berries here that would be on the ground because they were ripe too early, and there would be some that potentially are not quite ripe.”

喬·希爾迪奇黑加侖種植戶
“這就導致瞭黑加侖的發芽情況不均，開花時間參差不齊，收成也非常不均衡。有一些漿果掉落在地上，因為它們成熟得過早，而另一些可能還沒有完全成熟。”

They’ll get a crop this year, but work is continuing to develop tougher blackcurrant varieties better suited to our changing climate.

雖然黑加侖種植戶今年會有收成，但還需繼續研究能承受更多環境變化的黑加侖品種，以更好地適應不斷變化的氣候。

Global warming is already making the UK’s weather hotter and wetter. What farmers can successfully grow in British soil is changing too.

全球變暖已使英國的天氣變得更加炎熱和潮濕。農民們能在這片土地上成功種植的作物也在隨之發生變化。