ANTELOPE ISLAND, Utah — Conservationists and volunteers fanned out across the Great Salt Lake for a new census of migrating birds that stop here.
They're counting birds across more than 700,000 acres of wetlands — roughly the size of the entire state of Rhode Island. The data they gather will be significant for policy proposals impacting the lake.
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"During peak migration? Half of the region’s shorebirds are here at Great Salt Lake because it’s so important," said Janice Gardner, the executive director of the Sageland Collaborative, which helped to put on the shorebird survey that was carried out on Friday.
Through binoculars and spotting scopes, birders and volunteers count shorebirds. It is not easy to take a census of migratory birds.
"You kind of break it up into sections and you have teams of three to four people," Gardner said, describing the challenge. It's divided up by bird species.
It was Alhondra Lopez's first time taking a bird census, but she was excited.
"For me? I feel connection to these shorebirds," she said.
The survey isn't just being conducted at the Great Salt Lake, but at other wetland areas across the West. The last time a shorebird survey was conducted in the western United States, it was in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
"We have this big 30-year data gap," said Max Malmquist, the saline lakes engagement manager for the Audubon Society. "The landscape has changed dramatically over the last 30 years with climate change, drought, water diversions."
The Great Salt Lake is a major habitat for the western hemisphere's migratory birds. As the lake has declined in recent years, so have some bird populations, Malmquist said.
"Great Salt Lake hosted over 250,000 American avocets, which is about 50% of the global population," he told FOX 13 News. "We’re seeing numbers, our preliminary data at Great Salt Lake is significantly lower than that."
Gardner likened the situation facing many lost wetland habitats to a gas station during a long road trip.
"They come to these places to forage, to fatten up so they can make it all the way to Argentina and they come here and there is no food. The gas station is closed," she said.
The Great Salt Lake dropped to its lowest levels in recorded history in 2022, alarming the public and political leaders. The lake has since risen about six and a half feet thanks to a pair of strong winters. But it is still several feet below what is considered ecologically healthy.
Gardner said this isn't just about the birds. What happens to the Great Salt Lake ultimately will impact all of us.
"If we understand how to protect the places, the habitat, the resources that shorebirds need," Gardner said. "We’re ensuring we don’t have a dry lake that’s causing noxious dust, we’re making sure the brine shrimp industry is still alive. We’re even making sure our extractive mineral industries are still thriving."
Some environmental groups have petitioned the federal government to declare the Wilson's phalarope an endangered species. It nests on the Great Salt Lake. Such a designation could open the door to strict new regulations on the lake. That's something state leaders have vehemently resisted.
The Sageland Collaborative said it takes no position on the endangered species petition, but the data gathered from the shorebird survey will likely be used as the government considers whether to grant or reject the application. It will also be used by politicians on Utah's Capitol Hill as they consider policies that impact the Great Salt Lake.
"Over the last four years, the state of Utah has done a good job at passing bills and creating tools for us to start addressing the declining levels of the Great Salt Lake," said Malmquist. "I think the challenge for us is things like water management, water rights, a lot of these tools are going to take time to implement."
Lopez, a Westminster University student who is doing an internship with Sageland Collaborative, said the Great Salt Lake is important not just to birds but the entire planet.
"It makes me feel I have to do something to also care about this planet," she said. "Because I'm enjoying it. In the same way I'm enjoying it, I have to be responsible. I have to take care of this land, not only for me but for all the living beings that enjoy it in the same way."
The survey will be carried out again in the spring and again in the fall until it wraps up in 2026.
