Great Basin (CA, NV, UT, OR, WY)
- Lake name:
- Great Basin (CA, NV, UT, OR, WY)
- Location:
- California; Nevada; Utah; Oregon; Wyoming
- Management agency:
- U.S. Bureau of Land Management (management of most of the land in the basin)
- Region associations:
- Great Basin
- Comments:
- A modelling research article, not a survey. The Great Basin is a large arid region that includes smaller basins, such as the Great Salt Lake and the Klamath Basin. Precipitation does not flow out towards the ocean but rather evaporates or sinks into groundwater and interior waterbodies that tend to be saline. The Great Basin is one of the dryest regions of the U.S. and spans across the states of Nevada, Utah, and parts of Wyoming, Oregon, Idaho, and California. Temperate desert, sagebrush landscapes, saline lakes, and mountainous terrain support a diversity of wildlife. The Great Basin faces water resource challenges like other arid regions. High water demand, drought, and climate change have resulted in drastically low water levels in waterbodies throughout the region. Various public-private partnership alliances and resolutions have been proposed to address these ongoing resource issues.
Surveys (1)
Survey Citation:
Haig, S. M., S. P. Murphy, J. H. Matthews, I. Arismendi, and M. Safeeq. 2019. Climate-Altered Wetlands Challenge Waterbird Use and Migratory Connectivity in Arid Landscapes. Scientific Reports 9:4666.
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Time period
N/A -
Source
Peer-reviewed -
Both Western and Clarks?
N/A
| Count Type | Range | Max | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Max Adults | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Most Recent Adults | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Max Nests | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Most Recent Nests | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Max Chicks | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Most Recent Chicks | N/A | N/A | N/A |
Comments:
Not a survey but describes diminished use of Great Basin wetlands by waterbirds throughout the year due to climate change impacts on hydrology. Climate change impacts on these wetlands include reduced water availability, higher salinity, reduced snowpack, reduced streamflow, decrease in water quality, reduced lake size, warmer temperatures, drier/drough conditions, etc. Looking at trends in waterbird abundance via USGS BBS (1968-2015) and trends in temperature, precipitation and streamflow (1980-2015 for these), there is a negative relationship for Western and Clark's grebes with temperature (-0.54) and precipitation (-0.28) trends and a positive (0.10 for duration, 0.34 for magnitude) with streamflow trends.