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For thousands of years, native Takhi horses roamed the steppes of Central Asia.
几千年来，土生土长的蒙古野马一直在中亚的大草原上游荡。
But by the late 1960s, they’d become extinct in the wild—the last herds struggling in meager habitats against hunters and competition from local livestock.
但到 1960 年代后期，它们在野外灭绝了——最后一批在贫瘠的栖息地防备着猎人并与当地牲畜竞争。
Some small groups of Takhi survived in European zoos, but their extinction still seemed inevitable.
一些小群的蒙古野马在欧洲的动物园里幸存下来，但它们的灭绝似乎仍然是不可避免的。
To prevent this terrible fate, a coalition of scientists and zoos pulled together to start an international Takhi breeding program.
为了防止这种可怕的命运，一个由科学家和动物园组成的联盟开始了一个国际蒙古野马的繁殖计划。
By the 1990s, these collaborators in Europe and the US began releasing new generations of Asia’s ancient wild horse back into their native habitat.
到20世纪90年代，这些在欧洲和美国的合作者开始将新一代的亚洲古老野马放归到它们的原生地。
This Takhi revival was a world-famous conservation victory, but the full story is much more complicated than it first appears.
这次蒙古野马复兴是举世闻名的保护胜利。但整个故事比表面看起来更为复杂。
And its twists and turns raise serious questions about the role of zoos and what conservation even means.
而它的曲折引发了关于动物园的作用和保护的意义的严肃质疑。
To get the whole story, we need to start in the late 1800s when Russian explorer Nikolay Przhevalsky was gifted the remains of one of these wild horses.
为了了解整个故事，我们需要从19世纪末开始，当时俄罗斯探险家尼古拉·普热瓦尔斯基得到了其中一匹野马的遗骸作为礼物。
Though the Takhi had long been known to local Mongolians, European scientists were intrigued by the remains, which looked more like those of a donkey or zebra than any known domestic horse.
尽管蒙古野马早已为当地蒙古人所熟知，但欧洲科学家对这些遗骸很感兴趣，它们看起来更像驴或斑马，而不是任何已知的家养马。
They concluded the species was a sort of missing link between wild asses and modern horses.
他们得出结论，该物种是野驴和现代马之间缺失的一环。
And as reports of the newly dubbed Przhevalsky’s horse circulated through Europe and America, zoo proprietors became eager to acquire the previously unknown species.
随着有关蒙古野马被新命名为普氏野马在欧洲和美洲流传的报道，动物园经营者开始渴望获得以前不为人知的物种。
At this time, zoos were focused primarily on drawing visitors with exotic animals, and their exhibitions were more concerned with entertainment than animal welfare.
此时，动物园主要关注的是用异国动物吸引游客，他们的展览更关注娱乐而不是动物的安康。
But in the early 1900s, the near extinction of the American bison and the total extinction of other species like the passenger pigeon inspired zoos to rebrand as centers for conservation.
但在 1900 年代初期，美洲野牛几近灭绝，以及候鸽等其他物种的彻底灭绝激发了动物园采用保护中心的名称。
And as it became clear that Przhevalsky’s horse might be headed for a similar fate, zoos began breeding programs to sustain the captive population.
当人们意识到普氏野马可能会面临类似的命运时，动物园开始了繁殖计划以维持圈养种群。
However, the individuals behind these programs came to an interesting conclusion about how the horses should be bred.
然而，这些项目背后的个人得出了一个关于如何饲养马匹的有趣结论。
Like their colleagues, they believed the species represented a missing link between modern domestic horses and their more primitive ancestors.
和他们的同事一样，他们认为该物种代表了现代家马与其更原始的祖先之间缺失的一环。
They also knew that some of the horses in their collections weren’t purebred Takhi, and many didn’t even resemble the species’ standard description.
他们还知道，他们收藏的一些马不是纯种的蒙古野马，许多甚至与该物种的标准描述不符。
So breeders felt it was up to them to determine what a wild Takhi should look like, and breed them accordingly.
因此，育种者认为由他们来决定野生蒙古野马应该是什么样子，并据此进行繁殖。
Basing their work on just a few specimens and broad beliefs about what a primitive horse might look like, they created a rigorous model for the ideal Takhi.
他们的工作仅基于几个样本和对原始马可能长什么样子的广泛看法，他们为理想的蒙古野马创建了一个严格的模型。
And over the 20th century, breeders in western zoos and private collections created a population of thousands of horses all carefully bred to share the same physical characteristics.
在 20 世纪，西方动物园和私人收藏的繁育者创造了数以千计的马种群，所有这些马都经过精心培育，具有相同的身体特征。
Of course, in their native habitat, wild Takhi had regularly interbred with domesticated horses for millennia, producing a population with much more diverse appearances.
当然，在它们的原生栖息地，野生蒙古马与家养马匹有规律地杂交了数千年，产生了一个外观更加多样化的种群。
So when it was time to introduce the Takhi to their ancestral home, they were quite different from the horses who’d been taken from those steppes a century earlier.
因此，当将蒙古野马被引入他们的祖先家园时，他们与一个世纪前从那些草原上带走的马截然不同。
Complicating things even further, while these new Takhi herds were no longer in zoos, to this day, almost all remain closely monitored and controlled for their own protection.
更复杂的是，虽然这些新的蒙古野马群不再在动物园里，但直到今天，几乎所有的蒙古野马群都受到密切监视和控制，以保护它们。
So in a strange way, it’s hard to say if these animals are actually in the wild or even if they’re truly Takhi.
所以以一种奇怪的角度，很难说这些动物是否真的存在于野外，甚至很难说它们是否真的是蒙古野马。
The story of the Takhi horse is not unique.
蒙古野马的故事并不独特。
In many of our conservation victories, it’s difficult to say exactly what was saved, and the role that zoos play in conservation can be very complicated.
在我们取得的许多保护成果中，很难准确地说出保存了什么，而且动物园在保护中扮演的角色可能非常复杂。
It's clear that zoos have been and can continue to be significant forces for animal preservation, especially efforts to save charismatic animals from extinction.
很明显，动物园已经并将继续成为动物保护的重要力量，尤其是拯救具有超凡魅力的动物免于灭绝的努力。
But today, the most direct cause of animal extinctions are humanity’s impacts on animal habitats and Earth’s climate.
但今天，动物灭绝的最直接原因是人类对动物栖息地和地球气候的影响。
So if zoos truly want to help protect the diversity of animal life on this planet, perhaps they should redirect their efforts to preserving the natural habitats these animals so desperately need.
因此，如果动物园真的想帮助保护这个星球上动物生命的多样性，或许他们应该重新努力转向保护这些动物迫切需要的自然栖息地。
