BirdWatching USA – September-October 2019

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42 BirdWatching • September/October 2019

championed this effort as actively and
persuasively as Audubon California. It
and several other environmental groups
built a scientific database that clearly
verified the sea’s importance to a large
diversity of birdlife. Their research
demonstrated that many species have
utilized the sea, often in staggering
numbers: tens of thousands of American
White Pelicans during summertime,
many thousands of Black Terns, and
huge concentrations of Eared, Clark’s,
and Western Grebes during winter.
Because of their critical resource to
birdlife, the Salton Sea and the adjacent

Imperial Valley to the south are

designated as globally Important Bird

Areas. In 2018, Audubon California’s

advocacy efforts with state legislators led

to landmark funding to put sea-saving

strategies into action. For the first time,

the state committed substantial funding,

about $280 million, to habitat restoration

and dust mitigation.

While several restoration projects to

create almost 30,000 acres of wildlife

habitat and control dust are identified in

the state’s 10-year restoration plan, those

projects are already behind schedule. A

recent report says only a few projects

have been initiated so far, and in fact,

Audubon says, about “60,000 acres of a

mosaic of habitats are needed” in the

region. (For more on the report, see

sidebar, page 40.)

Discussions of ways to reverse the

downward spiral and lower the salinity

and nutrient buildup have gone on for

years. Several novel — and some say

fanciful — approaches have been

suggested. One idea is to construct large

pipelines with pumping stations

between the sea and the Pacific Ocean

and Gulf of California, through which

water would be exchanged to lower the

sea’s salinity and nutrients.

Another proposal is to dig a canal,

or perhaps two canals, from the sea to

the Gulf of California. At a possible

price tag of several billion dollars, the

plan would include a large ditch that

would be navigable by ocean-going

vessels, thus stimulating commerce

with a long-range objective of

recouping costs and revitalizing the

area. Because of engineering

uncertainties, high costs, and land

acquisition difficulties that would be

CHANGING BIRDLIFE: American White Pelicans

once numbered in the thousands at the Salton

Sea, but in recent winters, only handfuls have

been counted. Other species, such as

White-faced Ibis, remain in large numbers in

the fields to the north and south of the sea.