Study blames global warming for shrinking species ('Natural selection' at work?)

SFGate.com ^ | 10/16/11 | Seth Borenstein - AP

[pabianice]

We were in San Antonio recently. To get to The Alamo from our hotel we walked through a mall. One of the kiosks was called "Get Bugged." It displayed all manner of insects preserved inside a cube of clear acrylic. It also displayed a variety of babby Red Ear Slider turtles (Trachemys scripta elegans) and various lizards. I was saddened to see the dead turtles as, while not endangered, are passive and colorful creatures.

[Hunton Peck]

Study after study shows...

[BigBobber]

Well, it’s called the “Greenhouse Effect” because humans invented greenhouses to grow smaller plants, right?

Don’t forget, all the smaller species grow near the equator - elephants, lions, tigers, apes, giraffes, anacondas.

[tbw2]

Humans are still protein hungry, and where they do not hunt, their pets do. The shrinking animal size could be a survival trait to avoid being eaten. It could also be a response to fragmented habitat in urban and suburban areas, to permit more animals to survive in a smaller green belt. In both cases, the shrinkage is the result of human spread, not global warming.

[rfp1234]

Sadly, it still does cause the GOP establishment’s gonads to shrink (and their spines, too).