Coal News No 20
Last chance to save the snail
Scientists, DOC staff, green NGOs!
We need your support to head off an extinction!!
Only one hectare of P. "Augustus" habitat remains.
We have to move fast to save it.
There is nowhere else for these snails to go. No suitable alternative habitat has been found for this specialist mountaintop dweller.
Until a few weeks ago the Department Of Conservation took the position that shifting the snail and mining its habitat was likely to make it extinct.
But DOC is now saying the snail won't go extinct because far more snails than expected have been discovered.
But it doesn't matter how many snails there are. If the new habitat is not suitable they will slowly die.
DOC has betrayed the snail to satisfy the government, which has agreed with Solid Energy that every last square meter of snail habitat with coal beneath should be mined.
In doing so, DOC has turned on its own scientists, in particular snail expert Kath Walker.
Kath used to be DOCs spokesperson on snails. But now we don't see her in the media. A journalist told me recently DOC has 'hidden' her. And its not long since DOC tried to make her redundant.
Kath Walker and the other scientists who are standing up for science over 'spin' need our support.
We need organisations like the Royal Society and scientists professional groups to speak out.
DOC staff need to show support for Kath with a petition or an open letter to the Director General.
This is not just about snails. It's about every endangered species in the country.
DOC's mandate is to save rare species, not help the mining, fishing, and tourism industries kill then.
Save Happy Valley Coalition, Buller Conservation Group and the local branch of Forest & Bird are fighting valiantly, but they can only do so much.
We need a burst of action at national level.
This dire situation calls for the top officials of F&B, ECO, Greenpeace and the Green Party to meet with the Prime Minister. Demand Helen Clark halts the extinction and directs DOC to put its considerable resources into saving the snail, not killing it.
Pete Lusk
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