sky island
n.— «From a parched sea of desert in southeastern Arizona, Mt. Graham rises 2 miles to a crested summit above the clouds. Isolated in time and space for 11,000 years, the mountain is what biologists call a sky island, “a cradle of evolution.”» —“A Desert Mountain Versus The Stars” by Carol Ann Bassett Newsday (Long Island, New York) May 5, 1987. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Critters, co-workers, and clothes: What do you call your favorite mixed-breed dog? There are Heinz 57 mutts and Texas brown dogs in the U.S., while in parts of the Caribbean they’re called potcakes and coconut retrievers. Plus, among firefighters...
Outer space, used with its modern meaning, appears as early as the 1840s in a poem by Emmeline Stuart-Wortley. Soon after, Alexander von Humboldt was using variations on it in his writings about the cosmos. By 1901, H.G. Wells was using outer space...