Salton Sea Management Program Avian Habitat Study

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Notice of intent to Award Only - The Salton Sea (Sea) is home to over 400 species of birds, making it one of the most important bird areas in the West and a vital part of the Pacific Flyway. The Sea will continue to shrink dramatically over the coming decades, with subsequent loss of open water and wetland habitats, a threefold increase in the sea’s salinity that will kill all fish life, and the release of toxic air contaminants. The Audubon Society shares other stakeholder beliefs, including Reclamation’s, that a smaller, sustainable Sea is achievable through prudent watershed restoration, habitat creation, water management infrastructure investments, and land acquisition based on the model successfully implemented at Owens Lake, a critically affected important large lake in Northern California nearly dried up as a result of over-use for urban water needs, causing habitat devastation and major air quality health issues throughout the region. In order to ensure that actions taken at the Sea continue to provide baseline habitat quality and extent, and to inform management decisions by key stakeholders such as Reclamation and the State of California, Audubon will map baseline habitats at the Sea. This effort fills a need articulated by the Assistant Secretary for Salton Sea Policy at California’s Natural Resources Agency, and who has identified Audubon as best suited to do this work because of their successful work at Owens Lake for the same habitat issues. Audubon will work to identify a baseline for habitat needs and conditions necessary to maintain habitat conditions over time so that the final plan can be designed to maintain the baseline habitat level and continue to support populations of birds that have come to rely on the Sea for replenishment and rest. Audubon will work with key stakeholders to agree upon a baseline year or range of years. A habitat suitability index/model for each of the suites of species that use the Sea will be developed. Metrics will be based on the conditions needed to support various species guilds, and will be science-based (e.g., salinity, water depth, etc.) and peer-reviewed. Baseline habitats could then become the goals for restoration. This approach will be modeled directly after the methodology used successfully at Owens Lake by Audubon.

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