George is dead and his species likely extinct. It’s the loss of a ‘crown jewel of evolution.’

A one-inch Hawaiian snail is dead, and his species is likely gone forever. 

The New Year’s Day death of the small, 14-year-old snail, named George by Hawaiian scientists, is yet another blow to the native Hawaiian ecosystem, which as the most isolated group of islands on the planet contains species found nowhere else.

But overexploitation, invasive predators, and climate change are continuously knocking out the critters here. And it’s happening fast.

“We’re witnessing complete extirpations at a rate that’s pretty remarkable,” David Sischo, the snail extinction prevention program coordinator at the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources, said in an interview. Read more…

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