“Pygmy shrews, one of the rarest of North American mammals and one of the smallest mammals in the world, deserve more than our respect, but our allegiance. Every muscle, organ, bone and sense that we have, so do they but within a three inch, four gram body. The task of keeping these complex bodily functions going but with so little surface area to keep them warm, means their life is short and intense. Their life energy flares just briefly then is extinguished. They have survived every hostile environment thrown at them from meteoric scorching to glacial steamrolling. How do they survive? What do we know of pygmy shrews? Virtually nothing which is strange is this age of scorching and steamrolling.”

Briony Penn, Author of The Real Thing: The Natural History of Ian McTaggart Cowan.