Quarterly Newsletter: January 2025

Happy New Year, friends of the Bodie Hills!

While the snow year started off strong in November, December and January have proven themselves to be a bit dry. While this may bring dismay for many snow sport enthusiasts, opportunities to hike and visit Bodie State Park remain on the horizon with the lack of fresh snow. Highway 270, the paved road into the park, is open and Bodie State Historic Park remains open as well: winter hours are 9:00 am-4:00 pm daily. Highway 270 may be closed to the public at any time by Caltrans depending on the weather.

In this first edition of 2025, we have local news, federal policy updates, and mining updates from the Nevada side of the Bodie Hills, featuring new opportunities to get involved.

Thank you for reading,

The Bodie Hills Conservation Partnership (BHCP)

Mining Updates

Watch "the Harms of Exploratory Drilling"

There are currently five exploratory drilling projects in the Bodie Hills, all of which are on the Nevada side. Why are we so concerned about exploratory drilling? BHCP Landscape Health Subcommittee member and Chair of the Sierra Club Range of Light Group Lynn Boulton has prepared a great video explaining why. Watch "The Harms of Exploratory Drilling" for more information on this ongoing and worsening issue across not only the Bodie Hills, but the whole west.

Photo taken by Joanne Hihn of areas being explored for gold. These projects would be visible from U.S. 395, Panum Crater, and Mono Lake's South Tufa area. The exploration projects go from the saddle between West and East Brawley Peak to Spring Peak, which can be seen from the Mono Basin. More sites are on the north side of Mt. Hicks and behind East Brawley Peak.

New Exploratory Drilling Projects:

THE LODESTAR PROJECT

The fifth and latest addition to the Bodie Hills exploratory drilling destruction in Nevada is the Lodestar project. It is adjacent to the fourth project, the Polaris Project, and is operated by Headwater Gold.

The scoping Categorical Exclusion (CE) document for the Lodestar Mineral [gold] Exploration Project was scheduled to be released in February, but that is likely to be delayed. Headwater Gold wants to drill in 43 places in a dense pinyon woodland on the east side of the Aurora Crater.

See Where They Want to Drill

THE POLARIS PROJECT

The Polaris Exploration Project is a proposed ten-year long gold exploration project in the Bodie Hills surrounding the historic Aurora Mining District. It is the biggest of the drilling projects in the Bodie Hills.

The Environmental Assessment (EA) for the Polaris [gold] Exploration Project is scheduled to be released in February. Klondex/Hecla Nevada wants to drill in 250 locations from West Brawley Peak to the south side of the Aurora Crater. Many drill sites are in an Inventory Roadless Area, in Bi-State Sage Grouse territory, and in the best deer hunting area in Mineral County. The project would remove an estimated 4,000 mature pinyon trees. The views from the top of East Brawley Peak are stunning--but won't be after this drilling project.

See Where They Want to Drill

Ongoing Exploratory Drilling Projects:

SAWTOOTH RIDGE

The Sawtooth Ridge drilling project is on the Nevada side of the Bodie Hills next to the historic Aurora Cemetery, mainly on the wooded slope on the east face of Mt. Chalcedony.

There was no drilling activity at Sawtooth Ridge by Klondex/Hecla Nevada in 2024. Klondex drilled at three of the 16 approved sites in 2023. This project was approved as a Categorical Exclusion (CE) and their 1 calendar year for drilling under a CE is now up. However, the 13 locations they have not drilled yet overlap with their proposed Polaris project.

SPRING PEAK

Spring Peak is in the southeast corner of the Bodie Hills on the south slope of Aurora Peak in Nevada. This project started in September 2020.

Spring Peak continued into Summer 2024, with the Forest Service counting the one year offered under the Categorical Exclusion (CE) not as a calendar year but as the number of days the company spends at the site, i.e., the company has 365 days to complete their work. This has led to the project going into its fifth year of disturbance. They also drilled on the private property adjacent to the Forest Service land. The company was told that 2024 would be their last year to drill.

BALD PEAK

There were two Radius Gold exploratory drilling projects started in the Bodie Hills. One started in 2017 on the Nevada side of the Dry Lakes Plateau and the other in 2019 on the California side of the Dry Lakes Plateau. Both were called Bald Peak.

There has been no drilling activity at Bald Peak by Paramount Gold and no word when they plan to start. This project was approved as a categorical exclusion in 2022. It is yet unknown if drilling will continue at Bald Peak in 2025. BHCP members will continue to monitor.

Volunteering Opportunities

Interested in Getting Involved?

We need volunteers with a variety of skills to help us defend the Bodie Hills.

Here are just a few things we need help with:

On the Ground

Visiting the Spring Peak project site to see what reclamation still is needed, helping document the site (requires vehicles with good tires)
Visiting the Lodestar/Polaris project sites to document pinyon trees
Visiting the Polaris project site to document the site before drilling begins

Spreading the Word

Video creation, including short forms and long forms
Social media design across platforms
Article writing for digital or physical publication

...and so much more!

Sign Up to Volunteer

Local News

On November 13th of 2024, Rob Mathias and Darren Hamrey of the Mineral County Sportsmen's Club presented to the Mineral County Commissioners seeking a letter of support in favor of protecting a portion of the Bodie Hills, referred to as the Mt. Hicks-Brawley Peak-Aurora Interconnected Ecosystem, against mining, drilling, and development. This location is where the Polaris project will be drilling.

The Mineral County Commissioners voted unanimously to submit a letter in support of protecting the ecosystems and the lands therein.

Policy Updates

On January 7, the Biden Administration announced that it is abandoning its proposed National Old-Growth Amendment, ending a more than two years planning process for a major policy change aimed at protecting the nation’s hundred-plus-year-old trees from the ravages of climate change. The draft rule, once published, was considered largely symbolic by many conservationists due to large loopholes which allowed logging within old-growth stands.

The proposed amendment was based on information from national forests and current old-growth conditions and was informed by substantial public input. The threat analysis report of mature and old-growth forests on National Forest System and Bureau of Land Management lands suggests that current management activities may not be responsive to rapidly changing disturbances and conditions that threaten old-growth forests including wildfire, fire exclusion, insects and disease, extreme weather, climate, temperature and more. Forest Service representatives claim that while the plan has been withdrawn, the research done to support it can still support old-growth forests in the future.

The Administration withdrew the notice of intent to prepare a National Old Growth Amendment environmental impact statement in the Federal Register on Jan 10th 2025. Three of the five gold exploration projects (Sawtooth Ridge, Polaris, and Lodestar) in the Bodie Hills are in mature, and perhaps even old growth, pinyon woodlands.

Thank you for supporting the Bodie Hills Conservation Partnership (BHCP). If you would like to represent your Bodie Hills love out in your community, please message allison@friendsoftheinyo.org to have a BHCP sticker sent to your address: perfect for cars, water bottles, laptops and more!