Appalachia is home to plenty of survival stories, and thanks to botanists at the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, we can celebrate another one.

The running buffalo clover, which was once believed to be extinct, is now doing so well it has been taken off the endangered species list.

Because bison were responsible for helping to maintain the plant’s habitat and, well, we got rid of the bison, the plant disappeared more than 80 years ago.

Until its rediscovery in West Virginia in 1983, it was thought extinct.

Once known to grow in the Appalachian Mountains and Central Plains, its rediscovery in the Mountain State was followed five years later by ODNR’s Natural Areas and Preserves’ botanists finding the plant in the Buckeye State.

Those botanists made it their mission to support the plant as it spread. Because of their work, it is now found in a few nature preserves in Ohio, with the largest being in the Boch Hollow State Nature Preserve in Hocking County.

There are now nearly 7,000 running buffalo clover plants in Ohio, which means it has gone from being classified as extinct to being “threatened.”

And it sounds as though ODNR scientists plan to make sure it continues that upward trajectory.

It’s proof that good things DO still grow in West Virginia and Ohio when they’ve already disappeared everywhere else.

And it is proof that if we work hard enough to help those good things thrive, they do.

A great example of that can be found right here in Belmont County, where scientists, students and others have worked to protect the rare hellbender salamander that lives in Captina Creek.

Thanks to them and the determined people at the ODNR, we know just about anything is possible.