Local and national conservation groups sued the U.S. Forest Service today to challenge its approval of the Stibnite Gold Project, an open-pit cyanide leach gold mine in Idaho’s Salmon River Mountains.

The Forest Service says the South Fork Salmon River contains the “most important remaining habitat ... obligations without expanded mining activities,” said Fred Coriell, board member for Save the ...

Perpetua Resources, the mining company planning to dig in the mountains outside McCall, promises to clean up the site — including the damage done by decades of previous mining.