Volume 9 - July 2023
We have renamed our newsletter to reflect our commitment to protecting the lands surrounding Conglomerate Mesa, from the Inyo Mountains to the Coso Mountains. Thank you for reading, sharing, and supporting Inyo to Coso. Visit our website for more information or sign up here to receive future newsletters.
Conglomerate Mesa
Worth more than gold...
K2 Gold Mining Update
By Kayla Browne
In our last newsletter we recapped where K2 Gold, the mining company exploring for gold on Conglomerate Mesa, is at with their bid to expand their exploration. In short, K2 Gold has decided to move ahead with the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) process that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) required after receiving an unprecedented 23,000 comments from the public. Since then there have been some developments we’d like to share with you.
- The EIS process has moved out of state office and on to Washington.
- To date, Tracy Stone-Manning, Director of the BLM, has been briefed on the proposal.
- The BLM Ridgecrest office has conducted all requested briefings within the Department of the Interior (DOI).
- As this project is considered very high-profile and political, BLM received many requests to be briefed on the EIS proposal.
What’s next:
- The EIS will need to be approved by US Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland.
- A Notice of Intent (NOI) will be posted in the Federal Register, signifying the start of the public comment scoping period. Since the Federal Register has a backlog, we expect it to take 2-4 months from the time the DOI submits the request to post the NOI for the EIS.
- The comment period will be open for at least 30 days.
- Since this is a new analysis, comments previously received from the Environmental Assessment (EA) in 2021 will need to be resubmitted in order to be considered for the EIS.
- We believe the EIS will take approximately 18 months to complete.
We will keep you informed on the progress of this EIS and alert you when the comment period opens!
Botanical Abundance in Times of Change
By Maria Jesus
There is something about the abundance of flowers this year that feels utterly generous. The slopes of the Inyo and Coso Mountains have been awash in colorful blooms, providing a visceral sense of how water can transform the land.
Spring got a slow start this year and it was worth the wait! Friends of the Inyo hosted a wildflower walk in late April where participants spotted some of the first local blooms of the season including desert sunflower (Geraea canescens), western Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) and yellow pepperweed (Lepidium flavum). By mid-May, peak bloom had arrived and fields of apricot mallow (Sphaeralcea ambigua) set the Joshua tree woodlands aglow at Lower Centennial Flat. At higher elevations, the hills were colored purple with swaths of notch-leaved phacelia (Phacelia crenulata) and yellow-eyed lupine (Lupinus flavoculata).
Rare plant species emerged in great numbers from canyons of the Coso Mountains to the rocky slopes of Conglomerate Mesa. The tall and stately Panamint Mountains lupine (Lupinus magnificus var. magnificus) was found growing near Centennial Canyon in the Coso Mountains Wilderness. Very few botanical records exist for the Coso Mountains and this new observation suggests that there could be many more rare plant occurrences in the area.
Rare species like Badger Flat threadplant (Nemacladus inyoensis) and Parry’s monkeyflower (Diplacus parryi) have previously been documented at Conglomerate Mesa, but not in such large numbers and so close to proposed drilling sites. The abundance and location of these rare annual species can change considerably depending on seasonal conditions. Although botanical surveys have been conducted here previously to satisfy environmental analysis requirements for mining projects, these plants had not been detected, presumably due to low precipitation levels.
Many desert plants live in rhythm with the boom-and-bust cycles of annual precipitation. Seeds and deep taproots can stay dormant for years, if not decades, waiting for the right conditions to emerge. Unfortunately, tall species like single-leaf pinyon pine (Pinus monophylla) are not able to find refuge in the soil and are vulnerable to our increasingly arid climate. My first trip to Conglomerate Mesa this spring was bittersweet as I took in the widespread pinyon mortality resulting from the last several years of extreme drought conditions, which scientists have tied to human-caused climate change. Although these trees are of great cultural and ecological importance, they receive very little protection and stewardship under our current legal framework.
While the western Joshua tree has also suffered from the last few years of drought, it appears that at least locally, they are faring much better than the pinyon. There is some evidence of recent herbivory such as chewed periderm (a protective layer like tree bark), fallen limbs and a few dead trees, but not to the same degree as observed at lower elevations. Scientists have predicted that Joshua trees are most likely to persist at higher elevations at the northern part of its range. In California, this is primarily in the Inyo Mountains where Conglomerate Mesa is situated. Thanks to persistent efforts led by the Center for Biological Diversity, the Joshua tree is the first species to receive legal protections in California due to climate change threats. Time will tell how the Western Joshua Tree Conservation Act is enacted and enforced, but it is likely that the new legislation will benefit other species that live with Joshua trees.
Spend enough time in these places and they might begin to whisper to you. In the same moment that I am awe-struck by the abundance of life bursting forth all around me, I sense a question being asked of me, of us, when faced with the dying pinyon, the mining claim stakes, and our yet unwritten future.
Recent Events
Gold Mining 101
Wednesday June 14, 2023
Friends of the Inyo, Earthworks and Great Basin Resource Watch offered a free workshop to the public at the Owens Valley Paiute Shoshone Cultural Center in Bishop.
The aim of the workshop was to discuss how modern gold mining impacts Inyo and Mono Counties amidst a wave of new gold mining projects in our state that threaten local land, air, water and the rights of Indigenous communities.
The presenters were kind enough to share their slideshow.
