Eriogonum tiehmii, known as Tiehm's buckwheat, is a species of flowering plant endemic to the Silver Peak Range of Esmeralda County, Nevada in the United States. Its only known population is at high risk of destruction due to proposed mining for lithium (used for batteries in electric vehicles) by Australian company Ioneer. In 2020, a noticeable decline in the known population was attributed to the mining operation. Taxonomy It was first formally named by American botanist James L. Reveal in 1985 in The Great Basin Naturalist. Reveal named the plant for Arnold "Jerry" Tiehm who first collected the species in 1983, while working at the New York Botanical Garden and hiking through the American West in search of new plants. Description Eriogonum tiehmii is a small, perennial herbaceous plant, growing about across and up to tall with blue-grey leaves. The leaves are long and across with white or grey hairs on both surfaces, sometimes losing the hairs on the upper surface as it ages. It flowers briefly in the spring, after rains, with a small round yellow bloom. Conservation status Tiehm's buckwheat is considered critically imperiled ("at very high risk of extinction or elimination") due to its small population, small habitat and threat from mining activities; Tiehm was once quoted as saying "you could wipe the buckwheat out with a bulldozer in a couple of hours". Mining exploration has increased the prevalence of invasive species in its habitat. a planned open cast lithium mine by Ioneer is expected to destroy up to 90% of the habitat and approximately 50–70% of the known population. There have been efforts by conservation groups, including the Center for Biological Diversity, to gain federal protection for the species and block mining exploration in its habitat, and research funded by Ioneer has been conducted to investigate a possible relocation of the plants, but results have shown that the buckwheat does not react well to soil from other locations, having evolved for the combination of lithium, boron and clay in its current habitat. Dan Patterson, a whistleblower from the Bureau of Land Management who previously worked for the Centre for Biological Diversity, accused Ioneer of applying for exploration permits in a manner designed to avoid environmental reviews, which can be time-consuming and costly. Patterson filed a larger complaint arguing that the BLM district office had a pattern of rapid approval of projects without appropriate concern for environmental