In the sleeper movie Rare Birds, Michael (William Hurt) plays the role of innkeeper along a lonely stretch of coastal New Brunswick. To lure birdwatchers to his hidden oasis, and thus keep his business in business, he reports a thought-to-be-extinct Tasker’s Sulphurious Duck (in real life a non-existent species). The birders flock to the area, discover his fine cuisine, and save his business and life. For Davis County, located north of Salt Lake City, the draw is a lot easier with fact rather than fiction.

Many locals and visitors flock to the Great Salt Lake to see two things: the saltiest inland lake west of the Mississippi that averages 3-7 times saltier than sea water, and the incredible numbers of migratory or nesting waterfowl, shorebirds and colonial birds. The staring cast of avian characters resembles a Tolkien trilogy with plovers, dowitchers, phalaropes, godwits, dunlins, and stilts. Alongside these shorebirds come cormorants, pelicans, gulls, ducks, swans, and geese that represent an avian congregation that can number into the millions. These birds feast upon the lake’s brine shrimp and brine flies, the two primary invertebrate species that tolerate the overwhelming salinity.

Based upon sheer numbers of feathered visitors, the Great Salt Lake has been nominated to the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network. This network links areas critical to staggering numbers of migrant and nesting birds. The lure here is habitat, with vast expanses of open water, brackish wetlands, fresh-water marshes, and playas. Here some 50% of the world’s population of Wilson’s phalaropes stage during migration. Also over half of the U.S. snowy plover population west of the Rocky Mountains nests along the lake’s shoreline, and, in winter, the population of bald eagles is in the Top Ten for the Lower 48 states. The islands that dot the lake contain one of the three largest American white pelican breeding colonies in western North America, while the upland supports the world’s largest breeding population of white-faced ibis. And don’t forget the State Bird, the California gull, whose ever present squawking seems out of place in this Intermountain west birding hotspot.

How hot? Spectacular would be an understatement, but these accolades describe this bird watchers paradise. Bird Watcher’s Digest lists the lake as one of 25 “must see” birding sites, while Audubon rates it as “one of the top 17 birding trails” in the nation. Antelope Island gets singled out in an issue of Sunset as one of the top five wildlife-viewing areas in the Rocky Mountain region. Pretty impressive for a state known better for the Winter Olympics and the dominant religious group, the Church of Latter Day Saints.

Even the faithful find time to bird the lake, and there is no better time than during the 6th annual Great Salt Lake Bird Festival. Davis County Tourism, along with a flock of sponsors, will host the event May 14-22, 2004. Centered at the Davis County FairPark in Farmington, Utah, just north of Salt Lake City, participants can enjoy the spectrum of workshops and field trips aimed to educate visitors about the ecology of this natural wonder and to enhance ecotourism in Davis County. Targeted to hard-core birders or the fresh novice, children and adults, the Festival’s schedule offers something for everyone.


Starting things off will be John Acorn, AKA the Nature Nut. Acorn is perhaps best known for a natural history television series that airs of Canadian Learning Television and the Discovery Channel. He is the writer and host of “Acorn, The Nature Nut”, but he is also an accomplished musician, storyteller and scientist, whose approach is to engage his listeners with personal accounts or funny moments that brings alive the natural world.

This will be his first public appearance in Utah. Acorn will address the Northridge High School students on Friday morning (May 14), then present an evening performance at a free public performance that evening after the “Quackers and Cheese” social. Like the duck said, “Just put that charge on my bill.”

Avian puns aside, Acorn will be conduct a book signing before providing the keynote address at the festival’s annual Dutch oven dinner on Saturday, May 15. Advance tickets are highly recommended for this sure-to-be entertaining evening.

If you can’t make the evening presentation, check out the various workshops and fieldtrips on the Festival’s website. Many are free or have a minimal cost. There will be vendors, display booths and workshops at the FairPark in Farmington for young and old on Friday and Saturday, May 14 and 15. The free workshops, presented by local wildlife agency personnel or members of the birding public, will focus on topics like bird identification, birdhouse construction, brine shrimp ecology, and landscaping for wildlife to name just a few. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources will have their new “Virtual Reality Fishing” program available, and scouting conservation officers will be on hand to work with children on obtaining merit badges.

For ticket information, field trip reservations, workshop schedules, accommodation specials, and maps, visit the Festival’s website at www.greatsaltlakebirdfest.com, or call Davis County Tourism at 801-451-3286 for registration information and tickets for Saturday’s festival dinner.


Damian Fagan is a naturalist living in Moab, Utah.