Water levels in Oregon’s remote, salty Lake Abert dropped to unusually low levels in July 2013. The salt concentrations became too high, even for the few species that had adapted to the salty water. Small brine shrimp and alkali flies died en masse. By September, so much water had been lost that the salts precipitated in a glistening white crust of triangular crystals.
Daily shorebird counts had reached 350,000 by July – a higher density than found even at the Great Salt Lake – but after the lake dried out and remained empty the following summer, bird counts dropped by 90%.
In 2014, 2015, 2021 and 2022 the lake remained largely dry and the number of birds decreased. An unusually wet season last winter replenished some of the lake’s water, but scientists warn that the overall trend is still one of decline and that the factors that dried up the lake still persist.
Most people have never heard of Lake Abert, but it is a crucial stopping point for migratory birds that have evolved to live in salty inland waters. However, in the past decade the lake has dried up five times, sparking recriminations between conservationists and local farmers, who use water from the lake’s tributaries to irrigate their land.
Ultimately, the two groups decided to collaborate in 2022, following in the footsteps of the numerous collaborative conservation groups that have helped diverse stakeholders in the rural American West find common ground on topics like fire and species conservation.
Now the partnership faces a new stress test: the reality that there simply isn’t enough water in the climate-changed American West.
Terminal or sink lakes such as Abert form at the lowest point of closed basins, which have no surface outlet. In the American West there are only a few large and permanent terminal lakes, including Abert, the Great Salt Lake, Mono Lake, and the Salton Sea.
These closed-basin water systems are unusual because “you only get one shot of water – what you see is what you have,” says Colleen Withers, a seventh-generation rancher in the basin.
The overuse of the water spells Abert’s fate. The land and the lakes have a voice, and no one listens
Wilson Wewa, Warm Springs Paiute Tribe
Most of the water flowing into Abert comes via the Chewaucan River. As spring snowmelt sweeps across the valley’s steppe, ranchers divert the river into canals and flood the grassy marshes where their cattle live in winter and give birth to their young in spring.
These irrigation systems date back to the early 20th century, but diversions have increased over time. If all water extraction rights on the Chewaucan were fully utilized now, they would exceed the river’s flow. Climate change has also increased evaporation from the river and lake.
That’s worrisome to conservationists and scientists because of its implications for shorebirds like Wilson’s phalaropes and American avocets, which have adapted over time to live around salty lakes, learning to feed in ways that minimize their salt intake and developing specialized glands develop above their eyes to secrete. salting.
They are attracted to salt lakes because of the abundant invertebrates – since there are no fish or other birds to eat the flies and shrimp, they are plentiful and “just dead easy to eat,” in the words of Theo Dreher, president of the Oregon Lakes Association. While in Abert, the birds molt and double their body weight before beginning their arduous flight south – all the way to Argentina, in the case of the phalaropes.
However, when such lakes lose water and their salinity increases, the invertebrates cannot survive and there is not enough food for the birds’ needs. They are so specialized that they cannot live anywhere else, and with around 10% of the entire population of these shorebirds passing through Abert, the decline of the lake could have a drastic effect on the species.
“They are at a razor’s edge in terms of their physiological ability to survive – they are so dependent on these shallow salty lakes,” said Ron Larson, a retired scientist and member of the Oregon Lakes Association.
“We don’t want to get into a situation where populations get so low that they can’t recover.”
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Ranchers and landowners formed the Chewaucan Watershed Collaborative so they too can join the debate over the lake’s demise. The farmers emphasize the need to consider the Abert catchment as a whole.
For example, parts of the Fremont-Winema National Forest, through which the Chewaucan River flows, burned in 2021 due to prolonged drought. “Abert is at the end of the system and the entire system is affected,” said Tess Baker, a fourth-generation rancher in the basin.
It seemed like there was enough water for the lake and for this kind of irrigation… That’s just no longer the case
Theo Dreher
Baker, Withers, Dreher and their spouses met in May 2022 to discuss collaboration. “From those first meetings, we noticed that it was easy to talk,” says Dreher.
They solicited support from Oregon Consensus, an institution that sponsors complex conflict resolution, and spent the summer bringing together environmental groups, government agencies and local tribes to form the Partnership for Lake Abert and the Chewaucan.
After identifying their points of view, the group members realized that they did not have enough facts, so they commissioned six months of research that collected scientific data, traditional ecological knowledge of tribes and experiences of farmers.
One of the main differences concerns the ranchers’ water diversions. Ranchers claim their flood irrigation mimics the way the swamps functioned before the land was settled and drained in the late 1800s.
They say the marshes are home to a huge biodiversity of grasses – more than 50 species – and attract birds such as cranes, geese and stilts. “There is a symbiotic relationship between wildlife and ranching,” says Keith Baker, Tess’s husband.
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Conservation groups and the Oregon State Department of Fish and Wildlife supported the development of this flood irrigation in the 1980s. But Dreher disputes the claim that the practice mimics the natural hydrology of the marshes, saying such water use should be reconsidered as the effects of the West’s increasing heat and water shortages have become more visible.
“At the time it looked like there was enough water for the lake and for this kind of irrigation,” he says. “And the thing is, that’s just no longer the case.”
Other conservationists and scientists agree that Abert’s unique ecological function should be prioritized over wetland ecosystems found elsewhere. “All birds are important and they all have their needs,” says Ryan Carle, scientific director of Oikonos Ecosystem Knowledge.
But for certain shorebirds, he says, Lake Abert is “the only habitat that provides what they need. While it is important to irrigate habitat in the tank for ducks, there are also other habitats that ducks use.”
Wilson Wewa, of the Warm Springs Paiute Tribe, believes it is farmers’ responsibility to use less water. “Water is finite and its overuse spells its demise [Abert],” he says. ‘The land also has a voice, and so do the lakes, and no one listens to them.’
Elsewhere, two main solutions have been used to preserve lakes. In California, lawsuits invoking the public trust doctrine—which holds that states have a responsibility to protect bodies of water within their borders for the benefit of the community—mandated a minimum water level for Mono Lake. In September 2023, environmental groups in Utah announced a similar lawsuit for the Great Salt Lake.
Another option is to set minimum power requirements, which would require a certain amount of the Chewaucan’s power to reach Abert.
For now, the partnership members say they have no specific goal, but hope a solution emerges from the collaborative process. “We want water in Abert,” says Keith Baker, “because it means the whole system is happy.”