The island effect produces giant predatory house mice

I found out about this on "Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me: The NPR News Quiz."

‘Monster mice’ are eating island’s seabirds
Rodents evolved to triple normal size, attack much larger chicks

The island effect produces giant tortoises, giant (flightless) pigeons, and my favorite, giant monitor lizards (Komodo dragons). For some unknown reason, it also produces dwarf humans (Homo florensis) and dwarf elephants (which, according to island biogeographer David Quammen, were originally the chief prey of Komodo dragons).

EDIT: I originally spelled the name "Kwammen," for some reason

My wish list

Hey there belen1974 (and anyone who feels like buying me a gift from amazon.com) it seems that you can view my wish list by searching for "The Urban Pantheist" in the wish lists. I tried to change it to "urbpan" but it either didn't take, or it's still processing it.

Meet one another

Many of the people on my friends list keep journals about the nature around them. Some of you have friended each other, but in case you hadn't, and are interested, here's a little rundown:

artemii reports on the nature in her garden in the Boston area city of Somerville.
cottonmanifesto is my wife and partner, and takes great nature photographs. Also lots of dog pictures.
crunchywater is in Oregon, keeps exotic pets and makes weird art. Sometimes she goes on nature walks in dense jungly Oregon.
ema_nymtonsti is in Australia, which confuses me when she talks about how hot it is in January and such.
marmota_monax journals about life on her Western Massachusetts farm.
omphalina is a lichenologist in Oregon. I wish I could rewrite that sentence with my own name at the beginning.
rwblackbird is 35 miles or so out of Toronto, in beautiful woodsy areas, that he writes about and sometimes posts pictures of.
vyoma is a mycologist and nature photographer in Talahassee. His pictures are mind-blowing, and he knows a lot of stuff. He escapes studying calculus by going into the swamp to look at mushrooms and bugs.
wakarusa waxes eloquent about the copious wildlife around her in (of all places, to my mind) Kansas.

I'm very sorry if this post leads to stalking, but I hope you at least read one another's writing and look at one another's photographs. If you are offended by being listed here, I'll remove it.