A wholesome community of saline lakes within the Western United States is essential to the survival and wellbeing of thousands and thousands of waterbirds that rely upon these ecosystems for nesting, breeding, refueling, and relaxation. Nice Salt Lake is an irreplaceable cornerstone of this community. As one of many largest saline lakes within the Western Hemisphere, the Nice Salt Lake ecosystem helps roughly 12 million birds yearly and hosts globally vital populations. Growing water diversion, growth, and local weather stressors threaten the system’s resilience and instantly impression habitat high quality and availability for waterbirds. The challenges going through Nice Salt Lake are huge and these converging threats create an crucial for strategic habitat prioritization.
The Nice Salt Lake Birds and Habitat Evaluation (the Evaluation) is a science-based evaluation designed to tell conservation methods throughout the Nice Salt Lake watershed and help the Nationwide Audubon Society’s strategic priorities, with its core purpose specializing in defending birds and the locations they want, in the present day and tomorrow. Developed by Audubon’s crew of scientists, with enter from habitat and water specialists, this effort integrates habitat suitability, local weather projection, and human modification information right into a unified, spatial framework that identifies precedence conservation areas for waterbirds.
“Nice Salt Lake is likely one of the most necessary remaining strongholds for migratory birds as they make their hemispheric journeys alongside the Pacific Flyway,” stated Marshall Johnson, Chief Conservation Officer for Nationwide Audubon Society. “This evaluation contributes on to Audubon’s broader work to bend the fowl curve and gives beneficial perception to our companions—water and wetland managers, associate conservation teams, and policymakers—a shared, science-based framework for safeguarding Nice Salt Lake habitats and water assets.”
The Evaluation makes use of two analyses: an Aviation Prioritization Evaluation and a Hydrological Inflows Evaluation.
The Avian Prioritization Evaluation makes use of a habitat prioritization mannequin to judge Audubon’s Flight Plan indicator waterbird species throughout all seasons. Audubon scientists carried out a sequence of optimization analyses to establish precedence areas utilizing Zonation Conservation Planning software program. Analyses had been carried out for each current and midcentury (12 months 2025) timesteps primarily based on focal fowl suitability and relative abundance utilizing the strategies described in Deluca et al. (2023). The options being optimized are listed on the left facet of every field and embody current and future habitat and local weather suitability fashions for the breeding and nonbreeding seasons (Wilsey et al. 2019), in addition to relative abundance fashions for fall and spring migration seasons (Fink et al. 2024, Meehan et al. 2022), for all indicator species in all seasons through which they’re current within the watershed. The appropriate facet of every field signifies the panorama degradation attributes the mannequin goals to keep away from.
Moreover, as a part of this Evaluation, Audubon utilized a hydrologic mannequin that depicts potential contributions to Nice Salt Lake from upstream wetlands and flood-irrigated agricultural lands to establish alternatives for safety of flows to Nice Salt Lake and wetlands and water useful resource administration. The Evaluation illustrates how the Nice Salt Lake’s mosaic of interconnected habitats throughout the watershed is important for sustaining the area’s distinctive waterbird variety and abundance.
The Evaluation yields a number of key findings for conservation companions working within the Nice Salt Lake watershed:
- The open water of Nice Salt Lake and its surrounding wetland complexes—together with Bear River Migratory Hen Refuge, Farmington Bay, Ogden Bay, and Willard Spur Waterfowl Administration Areas—are of ongoing conservation precedence as a result of they supply important habitat in the present day that are also projected to persist below future local weather situations. Defending water flows and stopping encroachment on these habitats affords the best near-term conservation impression.
- Agricultural lands and degraded historic wetlands within the areas surrounding the lake symbolize conservation alternatives the place local weather suitability will stay excessive and the place restoration or land safety can generate long-term conservation worth.
- Sustaining and enhancing hydrologic connectivity—the community of streams, canals, and return flows that ship water from throughout the watershed to the lake and its wetlands—is as important to fowl conservation because the wetland footprints themselves.
“The way forward for Nice Salt Lake and its wetlands is intertwined with the choices we make within the surrounding watershed,” stated Marcelle Shoop, Director of Audubon’s Saline Lakes Program. “This science-based evaluation illustrates the place conservation will make the largest distinction for waterbirds species—and makes clear that defending how water strikes to the lake and its wetlands is important for the way forward for Nice Salt Lake and our communities.”
The Evaluation yields a number of key findings for conservation companions working within the Nice Salt Lake watershed. Along with state and federal managers, non-public landowners, agricultural operators, water rights holders and native governments are important companions for taking benefit of the chance to keep the mandatory redundancy and ecological integrity that sustains the area’s distinctive waterbird variety.
To study extra about Audubon’s Nice Salt Lake Birds and Habitat Evaluation, download the full PDF or download a visual summary.
For companions seeking to entry the interactive internet software, please contact salinelakes@audubon.org for entry.
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DeLuca, W. V., Seavy, N. E., Grand, J., Velásquez-Tibatá, J., Taylor, L., Bowler, C., Deppe, J. L., Knight, E. J., Lentijo, G. M., Meehan, T. D., Michel, N. L., Saunders, S. P., Schillerstrom, N., Smith, M. A., Witko, C., & Wilsey, C. B. (2023). A framework for linking hemispheric, full annual cycle prioritizations to native conservation actions for migratory birds. Conservation Science and Observe, 5(8), e12975. https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.12975
Fink, D., Auer, T., Johnston, A., Strimas-Mackey, M., Ligocki, S., Robinson, O., Hochachka, W., Jaromczyk, L., Crowley, C., Dunham, Ok., Stillman, A., Davis, C., Stokowski, M., Sharma, P., Pantoja, V., Burgin, D., Crowe, P., Bell, M., Ray, S., Davies, I., Ruiz-Gutierrez, V., Wooden., C., & Rodewald, A. (2024). eBird standing and tendencies, information model: 2023. Cornell Lab of Ornithology. https://doi.org/10.2173/WZTW8903
Meehan, T.D., Saunders, S.P., DeLuca, W.V., Michel, N.L., Grand, J., Deppe, J.L., Jimenez, M.F., Knight, E.J., Seavy, N.E., Smith, M.A., Taylor, L., Witko, C., Akresh, M.E., Barber, D.R., Bayne, E.M., Beasley, J.C., Belant, J.L., Bierregaard, R.O., Bildstein, Ok.L., Boves, T.J., Brzorad, J.N., Campbell, S.P., Celis-Murillo, A., Cooke, H.A., Domenech, R., Goodrich, L., Gow, E.A., Haines, A., Hallworth, M.T., Hill, J.M., Holland, A.E., Jennings, S., Kays, R., King, D.T., Mackenzie, S.A., Marra, P.P., McCabe, R.A., McFarland, Ok.P., McGrady, M.J., Melcer Jr, R., Norris, D.R., Norvell, R.E., Rhodes Jr, O.E., Rimmer, C.C., Scarpignato, A.L., Shreading, A., Watson, J.L., & Wilsey, C.B., 2022. Integrating information varieties to estimate spatial patterns of avian migration throughout the Western Hemisphere. Ecological Purposes, 32(7), e2679. https://doi.org/10.1002/eap.2679
Wilsey, C., Bateman, B., Taylor, L., Wu, J. X., LeBaron, G., Shepherd, R., Koseff, C., Friedman, S., & Stone, R. (2019). Survival by levels: 389 fowl species on the brink. Nationwide Audubon Society, New York, New York, USA. https://www.audubon.org/climate/survivalbydegrees
