The dark sitana, a lizard endemic to a town in Nepal, is critically endangered by the loss and degradation of its habitat due to the BP Highway and unplanned urban development.

The critically endangered dark sitana (Sitana fusca), a rare lizard that hasn’t been reported anywhere else in the world, faces a host of challenges for its survival, most of them triggered by the highway development. “The main threat to its existence is the loss of its habitat, which has been fragmented and degraded by the construction of the BP Highway,” says researcher Santosh Bhattarai, who is pursuing a Ph.D. in herpetology.

The news has been featured in the following link on Mongabay.