For Speedy Launch
February 7, 2024
Contact:
Paul Ruprecht, Western Watersheds Undertaking, (208) 421-4637, [email protected]
Uncommon springsnail threatened by Thacker Cross Lithium Mine takes step towards ESA itemizing
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service introduced immediately {that a} petition from conservation group Western Watersheds Undertaking to listing the Kings River pyrg (Pyrgulopsis imperialis) underneath the Endangered Species Act (ESA) introduced info displaying that itemizing could also be warranted. The uncommon springsnail lives solely in 13 shallow, remoted springs close to the location of the Thacker Cross lithium mine in northern Nevada. The Service’s discovering places the snail on monitor for a standing assessment culminating in a 12-month discovering that will present full federal safety to the species and stop its extinction.
“The Kings River pyrg is a uncommon aquatic snail that has landed on the point of extinction resulting from close by lithium mining that threatens to de-water the native aquifer and dry up the springs the snail must survive, and likewise resulting from water diversions and habitat degradation on the springs themselves on account of cattle grazing,” mentioned Paul Ruprecht, Nevada Director for Western Watersheds Undertaking. “Strip-mining for lithium at Thacker Cross, as presently permitted, would finally contain pumping out the groundwater that feeds the springs inhabited by the Kings River pyrg, and with out satisfactory spring flows the snail would go extinct.”
The Thacker Cross lithium mine is sited in a sacred burial floor recognized to the Paiute and Shoshone as Peehee Mu’huh, or Rotten Moon, the place a band of at the least 31 Paiutes was massacred by a Nevada cavalry battalion in 1865. Indigenous teams oppose the Thacker Cross Lithium Mine and the destruction of their ancestral homelands.
The realm focused for destruction can also be Precedence Habitat for sage grouse, and supplies migration corridors for pronghorns and nesting habitat for golden eagles.
Based on Western Watersheds Undertaking’s petition, all the recognized springs inhabited by the uncommon springsnail already endure from a point of habitat degradation, a reality confirmed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service of their discovering, and spring flows have already been modified at 4 of the springs.
Threats to the pyrg embody livestock grazing, roads, drought, local weather change, and potential dewatering and contamination posed by the Thacker Cross lithium mine. As a result of the pyrg exists in extraordinarily shallow springs, the species is especially weak to local weather change impacts like frequent and extended drought, in addition to impaired water high quality from fugitive mud, runoff, and cattle.
“With out ESA safety, this distinctive springsnail will change into one other casualty of the lithium growth,” mentioned Ruprecht. “We’ll proceed to work to make sure that the pyrg will get the federal protections it must survive.”
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