The Great Salt Lake is Shrinking. What Can We Do to Stop It?

upstart writes:

The Great Salt Lake is shrinking. What can we do to stop it?:

At Antelope Island State Park near Salt Lake City in the fall of 2022, three duck hunters dragged a sled across cracked desert sand in search of the water's edge. The birds they sought were bunched in meager puddles far in the distance. Just to the west, the docks of an abandoned marina caved into the dust and a lone sailboat sat beached amid sagebrush.

"Biologists are worried that we're on the brink of ecological collapse of the lake," says Chad Yamane, the regional director of Ducks Unlimited, a nonprofit that conserves, restores and manages habitats for North America's waterfowl, and a waterfowl hunter himself.

Last fall, the Great Salt Lake hit its lowest level since record keeping began. The lake's elevation sank to nearly six meters below the long-term average, shriveling the Western Hemisphere's largest saline lake to half its historic surface area. The lake's shrinking threatens to upend the ecosystem, disrupting the migration and survival of 10 million birds, including ducks and geese.

[...] And the Great Salt Lake isn't unique. Many of the world's saline lakes are facing a double whammy: People are taking more water from the tributaries that feed the lakes, while a hotter, drier climate means it takes longer to refill them.

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