What is "inhabiting"

Usage examples of "inhabiting".

But whether it be species belonging to the same or to a distinct class, which yield their places to other species which have been modified and improved, a few of the sufferers may often long be preserved, from being fitted to some peculiar line of life, or from inhabiting some distant and isolated station, where they have escaped severe competition.

Annual and perennial plants, deciduous and evergreen trees, plants inhabiting different stations and fitted for extremely different climates, can often be crossed with ease.

Let it be remembered that the forms of life, at least those inhabiting the sea, have changed almost simultaneously throughout the world, and therefore under the most different climates and conditions.

But supposing for an instant, in this and other such cases, that the record of the first appearance and disappearance of the species was perfect, we have no reason to believe that forms successively produced necessarily endure for corresponding lengths of time: a very ancient form might occasionally last much longer than a form elsewhere subsequently produced, especially in the case of terrestrial productions inhabiting separated districts.

Geographical distribution may sometimes be brought usefully into play in classing large and widely-distributed genera, because all the species of the same genus, inhabiting any distinct and isolated region, have in all probability descended from the same parents.

But fear of man is slowly acquired, as I have elsewhere shown, by various animals inhabiting desert islands.

Nevertheless, such a conclusion, even if well founded, would be unsatisfactory, until it could be shown how the innumerable species inhabiting this world have been modified so as to acquire that perfection of structure and coadaptation which most justly excites our admiration Naturalists continually refer to external conditions, such as climate, food, &c.

Or, again, the wolves inhabiting a mountainous district, and those frequenting the lowlands, would naturally be forced to hunt different prey,.

I may add, that, according to Mr pierce, there are two varieties of the wolf inhabiting the Catskill Mountains in the United States, one with a light greyhound-like form, which pursues deer, and the other more bulky, with shorter legs, which more frequently attacks the shepherd's flocks.

Mr Wollaston has discovered the remarkable fact that 200 beetles, out of the 550 species inhabiting Madeira, are so far deficient in wings that they cannot fly.

The intermediate variety, consequently, will exist in lesser numbers from inhabiting a narrow and lesser area.

But a far more important consideration, as I believe, is that, during the process of further modification, by which two varieties are supposed on my theory to be converted and perfected into two distinct species, the two which exist in larger numbers from inhabiting larger areas, will have a great advantage over the intermediate variety, which exists in smaller numbers in a narrow and intermediate zone.

It is also obvious that the individuals of the same species, though now inhabiting distant and isolated regions, must have proceeded from one spot, where their parents were first produced: for, as explained in the last chapter, it is incredible that individuals identically the same should ever have been produced through natural selection from parents specifically distinct.

We see this same principle in the blind animals inhabiting the caves of America and of Europe.

With respect to distinct species of the same genus inhabiting very distant and isolated regions, as the process of modification has necessarily been slow, all the means of migration will have been possible during a very long period.