Category: Islands

Palaeoloxodon Falconeri

April 19, 2026 By arne hendriks Off

During periods of low sea levels around 500,000 years ago, full-sized straight-tusked elephants (Palaeoloxodon antiquus), which stood roughly 4 meters tall and weighed up to 10 tons, migrated to several Mediterranean islands. The elephants trapped on these islands started shrinking. On the mainland, being very…

Island Dwarf Zoo

May 15, 2012 By arne hendriks 3

The Dwarf Zoo is a growing archive of insularly dwarfed animals. Often when a species gets stuck on an island their size changes. Sometimes they grow larger like the giant turtles on the Galapagos. In Dwarf Zoo however we are interested in insular dwarfs; island…

1/6th Red Deer

April 8, 2012 By arne hendriks 0

Massive global evolutionary shrinkage may only manifest itself when it’s already too late. Even then it’s difficult to predict how much time it will take before man has adjusted to the new circumstances. Our best indication of human evolutionary shrinkage is the case of Homo floresiensis…