Red-bellied piranhas make three distinctive sounds when communicating about how much they will mess each other up. Cynthia Graber reports

當(dāng)需要與多方進(jìn)行溝通時(shí)，紅腹食人魚(yú)用３種不同的聲音進(jìn)行溝通。辛西婭格.格雷伯報(bào)道。

Like a pit bull, piranhas will tear the flesh from your bones. Also like a pit bull, they bark. [piranha audio type 1] Kind of.　

如同斗牛一樣，食人魚(yú)可以撕出人骨頭中的肌肉，它們也會(huì)像斗牛一樣的吼叫[食人魚(yú)音頻類型之一]。

Scientists had known that piranha barked when you pick them up—carefully, of course. But they hadn’t known what these sounds were for. So researchers examined how the vocalizations might correspond with behavior.

科學(xué)家已經(jīng)知道，當(dāng)人類擁抱食人魚(yú)時(shí)，它們會(huì)叫——當(dāng)然，人類要小心一些。但科學(xué)家不知道它們?yōu)槭裁窗l(fā)出這樣的聲音，因此研究人員對(duì)這種發(fā)音行為進(jìn)行了研究。

They dropped a microphone into a piranha tank that, at different times, held three groups of 10 fish. They then placed a mussel in to see how the fish competed for food.

在不同時(shí)段，科學(xué)家們把麥克風(fēng)放在食水魚(yú)水箱中，這個(gè)水箱中有１０條食人魚(yú)，它們?yōu)榉郑辰M。科學(xué)家們向水中投入貽貝，來(lái)觀察食人魚(yú)是如何爭(zhēng)奪食物的。

When the fish faced off, they produced that percussive bark. [piranha audio type 1]

當(dāng)食人魚(yú)開(kāi)始對(duì)抗?fàn)帄Z獵物時(shí)，它們發(fā)出撞擊式的聲音。[食人魚(yú)音頻類型之一]

When they circled one another, they made a softer thud sound. [piranha audio type 2]　

當(dāng)它們彼此轉(zhuǎn)圈游來(lái)游去時(shí)，它們發(fā)出一種柔和的撞擊聲。[食人魚(yú)音頻類型之二]

A teeth-gnashing [piranha audio type 3] indicated that a piranha was getting pretty ticked off as it chased a competitor.

食人魚(yú)發(fā)出咬牙的聲音[食人魚(yú)音頻類型之三]表示它們?cè)谧分饘?duì)手時(shí)，超越了對(duì)手。

The first two sounds are produced by muscles contracting around the fish’s swim bladder. The findings are in the Journal of Experimental Biology. [Sandie Millot, Pierre Vandewalle and Eric Parmentier, "Sound production in red-bellied piranhas (Pygocentrus nattereri, Kner): an acoustical, behavioural and morphofunctional study"; Piranha audio courtesy of Sandie Millot]

前二種類型的音頻是通過(guò)食人魚(yú)膘周的肌肉發(fā)出的。這個(gè)研究成果發(fā)表在《生物學(xué)實(shí)驗(yàn)雜志上》。[作者：Sandie Millot, Pierre Vandewalle 和 Eric Parmentier,《紅色食人魚(yú)是如何發(fā)聲的》（Pygocentrus nattereri, Kne）：聲音、行為與功能研究；Sandie Milot的食人魚(yú)音頻禮儀 ]

The researchers are now interested in whether piranhas vocalize during mating. But they’ll have to travel to Brazil to study this in the wild—turns out that when it comes to mating in captivity, piranhas say, "no tanks."

研究人員現(xiàn)在研究，食人魚(yú)在交配時(shí)是否發(fā)聲。他們只有旅行到巴西才能進(jìn)行這項(xiàng)野外研究——尋找在圈養(yǎng)的情況下，食人魚(yú)什么時(shí)候開(kāi)始交配，但食人魚(yú)卻說(shuō)：“要在沒(méi)有水網(wǎng)箱的地方才能交配。”

—Cynthia Graber

——作者：辛西婭格.格雷伯