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George-Daniel Badileanu, a ranger for Conservation Carpathia, tiptoes through old-growth spruce forest holding a large antenna in his hand, a battery and receiver in his backpack.
喀尔巴阡保护基金会的巡山员乔治-丹尼尔·巴迪里亚努，蹑手蹑脚地穿过老龄云杉林，手中拿着大型天线，背包里装着电池和接收器。
We are high above Nucsoara. Every now and again, as Badileanu angles the cross-rods through the trees, the receiver's beeping pulse rises like a quickening heart.
努索瓦拉在我们下方很远的地方。巴迪里亚努在林中调整天线的横杆角度，接收器的哔哔声不时变得急促，像加速的心跳声。
We're in range of the radio collars. I'm about to see an animal that we dream of, one day, being able to introduce at Knepp.
我们进入无线电颈圈的范围里了。我即将看见我们梦想有朝一日能引进克内普庄园的动物。
I stumble after Badileanu across the spongy floor of bilberry bushes and moss, over fallen trees thick with lichens and a gushing stream banked with ferns.
我踉踉跄跄地跟在巴迪里亚努后面，走过长满越橘灌木和苔藓的湿软地面，越过满布地衣的倒下的树木和潺潺溪流，小溪旁尽是蕨类植物。
A whiff of musk and clouds of flies tell us we're close.
一股麝香味和成群苍蝇告诉我们目标就在附近。
Badileanu stops and points 40 yards ahead at arching silhouettes sliding like ghosts between the trees.
巴迪里亚努停下脚步，指向前方40码处，弓背的黑影在树木间如鬼魅般移动。
A herd of 12 bison passes before us, their woolly heads and crescent-moon horns swaying below hefty shoulders, long tails swishing from sloping rumps.
12头野牛成群结队从我们面前经过，毛茸茸的头和新月状的牛角在粗壮的肩部下方摇来晃去，长长的尾巴从斜斜的臀部甩过。
Their silhouettes conjure up the ocher figures of prehistoric European rock art.
它们的身影让人联想起史前欧洲岩画上的赭石形象。
The Carpathians were one of the European bison's last strongholds after they'd been hunted out of the rest of the continent.
欧洲野牛在这块大陆的其他地方被猎杀殆尽之后，喀尔巴阡山脉成了它们最后的几个大本营之一。
They disappeared from Romania about 200 years ago. Breeding programs in zoos and private parks brought them back from the brink.
大约200年前，欧洲野牛在罗马尼亚绝迹了。动物园和私人公园的繁殖计划把它们从灭绝边缘救了回来。
Around 7,000 European bison now roam rewilding projects across the continent.
目前约有7000头野牛在欧洲各地的野化地区漫步。
The herd in front of me, introduced to Nucsoara in 2022, is one of eight established in the Fagaras and monitored with help from a 2020 National Geographic Explorer grant for Barbara.
我眼前的这个野牛群是在2022年引进努索瓦拉的，2020年的国家地理探险家补助金资助芭芭拉监控安置在弗格拉什山区的八个野牛群，它们正是其中一群。
The great beasts, the largest weighing 2,200 pounds, tear at tufts of grass tougher than any other extant European herbivore can digest.
这种大型动物最重可达1000公斤，能嚼食欧洲现存草食动物都难以消化的草丛。
In the winter they'll gnaw the bark of trees, sometimes killing them -- a random thinning that brings patches of light into the forest where flowering plants and shrubs can flourish.
冬天它们会啃咬树皮，有时造成树木死亡，像这样的随机疏伐会让些许阳光照进森林，开花植物和灌木就能够茁壮生长。
They'll make other impressions on this mountainside, pawing with their hooves and tossing turf aside with their horns, creating wallows like the bunkers on a golf course, which they roll in to rid themselves of fur and old parasites -- microhabitats for fungi, lichens, wildflowers, mosses, lizards, and insects.
它们会在这个山腰上留下其他印记，用蹄扒土，用角掘草，弄出很像高尔夫球场上的沙坑后，在里面打滚，去除老旧皮毛和寄生虫--形成供真菌、地衣、野花、苔藓、蜥蜴和昆虫生活的微栖地。
And they'll be helping the climate too. Not far away, at the southern end of the Carpathians, a herd of bison introduced in 2014 have, according to the Yale School of the Environment, stimulated almost 10 times more carbon capture in nearly 20 square miles of grassland than before they were there.
它们也会对气候有帮助。根据美国耶鲁大学环境学院的调查，在不远处的喀尔巴阡山脉南端，2014年引进的一群野牛让将近50平方公里的草地的碳捕获量增加到它们来之前的几乎十倍。
Unlike the bears, the bison are often welcomed in Romania. Their memory is enshrined in place-names and folklore.
和棕熊不同，野牛在罗马尼亚往往很受欢迎。关于野牛的记忆铭记在地名和民间传说中。
In Leresti, about 50 miles from Nucsoara, a bison-themed visitors center is under way in the heart of the village. The mayor has named his local soccer team the Bison.
将近50英里外的雷瑞斯提镇上正在兴建野牛主题游客中心，就位在小镇中心，而且镇长已经把当地的足球队命名为野牛队。
I watch through my binoculars as slowly, purposefully, the bison shepherd three calves up to the alpine meadows to graze.
我通过我的双筒望远镜，看着野牛缓慢又坚决地带著三头小牛爬上高山草原去吃草。
I could be gazing into the past but also, I realize, into the future.
我意识到自己可能是在凝视过去，也在凝望未来。
