California’s shrinking Salton Sea
Once-bustling marinas on Salton City’s shallow water in California’s largest lake a few years ago are bone-dry. Carcasses of oxygen-starved tilapia lie on desolate shores. Flocks of eared grebes and shoreline birds bob up and down to feast on marine life.
An air of decline and strange beauty permeates the Salton Sea: The lake is shrinking — and on the verge of getting much smaller as more water goes to coastal cities.
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- Dead fish cover the shoreline of the Salton Sea in Imperial County, California. Some scientists attribute the deaths to increasing salinity as the sea shrinks and warm weather. Bonnie Jo Mount/Washington Post
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- Former boat launches no longer connect with the Salton Sea in Imperial County, California. The ongoing drought, along with improved agricultural methods, has diminished the size of the sea, creating a new set of environmental concerns. Bonnie Jo Mount/Washington Post
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- In this May 1, 2015 picture, Jose Alcantara, 17, behind, poses with his mother, Marta Sanchez, 45, in Mecca, Calif. Alcantara has become an activist for his mother, whose bronchitis worsened after the family moved to Mecca in 2010. The family believes dust from the exposed Salton Sea lakebed exacerbates respiratory illnesses in the region. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015 aerial picture, exposed lakebed of the Salton Sea dries out near Niland, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this composite picture made up of a 1960s postcard handout image, left, and a May 1, 2015, photo, a boat ramp is seen in the 1960’s and in present day near Salton City, Calif. The Salton Sea, an area that once drew more visitors than Yosemite National Park, now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (Al Scott/via AP /AP Photos/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, biologist Tom Anderson of the Sonny Bono Salton Sea National Refuge Complex steers an airboat across the shallow waters of the Salton Sea near Niland, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, an American coot runs across the surface of the Salton Sea before taking flight near Niland, Calif. Located on what is called the “Pacific flyway,” heavy migrations of waterfowl, marsh and seabirds take advantage of the Salton Sea during spring and fall. For them, the lake is a desert oasis from vast stretches of rock and sand. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 30, 2015, photo, Ed Victoria of Los Angeles sits under an umbrella as he fishes for tilapia along the receding banks of the Salton Sea near Bombay Beach, Calif. The lake is shrinking and on the verge of getting smaller as more water goes to coastal cities. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo. biologist Tom Anderson of the Sonny Bono Salton Sea National Refuge Complex steers an airboat across the shallow waters of the Salton Sea near Niland, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, farmer Al Kalin walks back to his truck on his farm near Westmorland, Calif. Kalin, who farms 1,800 acres near the Salton Seas’s southern shores, installed sprinklers and other water saving measures to replace flood irrigation over the last five years. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 30, 2015, photo, Bruce Wilcox of the Imperial Irrigation District speaks during an interview in front of cracked, exposed Salton Sea lakebed near Niland, Calif. The lakeís shrinkage has exposed about 25 square miles of salt-encrusted lakebed since 2003, with more likely to come. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, aerial photo, irrigated citrus trees sit surrounded by bone-dry land near Westmorland, Calif. The Imperial Valleyís half-million acres of verdant fields end abruptly in pale dirt that gets three inches of rain annually on average. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, aerial photo, exposed lake bed of the Salton Sea dries out near Niland, Calif. San Diego and other Southern California water agencies will stop replenishing the lake in 2017, raising concerns that dust from the exposed lake bed will exacerbate asthma and other respiratory illness in a region whose air quality already fails federal standards. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, aerial photo, sunlight reflects off irrigated fields near Mesquite, Calif. Colorado River water is diverted near Yuma, Arizona, to an 82-mile canal that runs west along the Mexican border and then north into 1,700 miles of gated dirt and concrete channels that crisscross farms.When gates open, water floods fields and gravity carries increasingly salty runoff downhill through the New and Alamo rivers to the Salton Sea. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, biologist Tom Anderson of the Sonny Bono Salton Sea National Refuge Complex makes a call along the receding banks of the Salton Sea near Niland, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015 picture, Frank Price, 65, stands under in the shade of his garage as he cleans his car in Salton Sea Beach, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, photo, Mark Messenger looks out over the Salton Sea as he prepares to sleep in his car on the banks in Salton City, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015 picture, oxygen-starved tilapia float in a shallow Salton Sea bay near Niland, Calif. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, aerial photo, morning light reflects off water in the All-American Canal near Calexico, Calif. Colorado River water is diverted near Yuma, Arizona, to an 82-mile canal that runs west along the Mexican border and then north into 1,700 miles of gated dirt and concrete channels that crisscross farms. When gates open, water floods fields and gravity carries increasingly salty runoff downhill through the New and Alamo rivers to the Salton Sea. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this May 1, 2015, aerial photo, irrigated citrus trees sit surrounded by bone-dry land near Westmorland, Calif. The Imperial Valleyís half-million acres of verdant fields end abruptly in pale dirt that gets three inches of rain annually on average. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, a dead tilapia floats among algae in a shallow Salton Sea bay near Niland, Calif. Though many species of fish have been brought to Salton Sea over the years, the hearty tilapia fish and native desert pupfish are the only ones left, and increasing salinity endangers them. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
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- In this April 29, 2015, photo, steam rises from geothermal mud pots near the banks of the Salton Sea near Niland, Calif., evidence of the region’s vast geothermal activity. Often called the “The Accidental Sea,” because it was created when the Colorado River breached a dike in 1905, Salton Sea now faces a looming calamity as coastal Southern California clamors for more water. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
San Diego and other Southern California water agencies will stop replenishing the lake after 2017, raising concerns that dust from exposed lakebed will exacerbate asthma and other respiratory illness in a region whose air quality already fails federal standards. A smaller lake also threatens fish and habitat for more than 400 bird species on the Pacific flyway.
Many of the more than 10,000 people who live in shoreline communities cherish the solitude but now feel forgotten. The dying lake must compete for water as California reels from a four-year drought that has brought sweeping, state-ordered consumption cuts.
Julie Londo, who moved to Salton City after visiting in 1986 from Washington state, hopes for help for the periodic, rotten odor from the lake that keeps residents inside on hot, fly-filled summer nights. The stench in 2012 carried more than 150 miles to Los Angeles.
“Unfortunately, that’s the only time anyone will listen because we don’t have a voice,” Londo, 60, said on her porch, one of the few that still lies a stone’s throw from water. “You can scream all you want. Nobody cares.” – BY ELLIOT SPAGAT / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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