SAVING THE SALTON SEA : OFFICIALS SEEK WAYS TO PREVENT DEATH OF STATE'S LARGEST LAKE.

Byline: Matthew Fordahl Associated Press

From the bay window of his factory-built home, Norm Niver sips a martini and watches thousands of birds glide over the Salton Sea as the setting sun reflects against the Chocolate Mountains.

``It's unreal,'' says Niver, a 66-year-old musician who has lived on California's largest lake since 1978. ``You sit here in the afternoon sun, and you'll see sea gulls in front of the window just hanging there.''

Outside, the scene changes like a mirage in the hot desert sun. The wildlife is still there - but so are dead fish, dead birds, a dying economy and a brackish sea 30 percent saltier than the ocean.

The Salton Sea is beautiful and lifegiving as well as nasty and lethal. An important stop for millions of birds on the Pacific Flyway, thousands have been killed by toxicity from dying fish. On higher ground, abandoned resorts rot in a climate that many say is superior to Palm Springs.

``One day, these birds will fly in and die here with no place to go,'' Niver said. ``And this will have consequences on the Western Hemisphere, if not the whole world.''

After years of debate on how to save it, officials have tentatively decided to sacrifice part of the 380-square-mile sea to prevent all of it from evolving into a giant, rancid salt flat.

The Salton Sea Authority wants to build a dike that would separate an inflow of fresh water from an evaporation pond on the other side. Salts and other contaminants would concentrate in the pond.

But before officials determine the size, location and cost of the dike, some people want to know who will get stuck with the bad water. Others are concerned the debate will take too long.

``We've already spent 20 or 30 years talking the Salton Sea to death,'' said Steve Horvitz, superintendent of Salton Sea State Park. ``It doesn't have another 30 years left.''

Formed more than 90 years ago by an engineering accident on the Colorado River, the sea lies 150 miles southeast of Los Angeles and 270 feet below sea level. Early in the century, developers promised landowners that they would have plenty of water, but the silty Colorado River plugged the source and cut off the water supply.

In 1905, engineers from the California Development Co. cut a channel into the Colorado south of the U.S.-Mexico border, and water again flowed into the valley. But flood waters almost busted through and filled the ancient lake bed known as the Salton Sink for 16 months.

Today, the water that gives the sea its biological diversity comes from agricultural runoff - the same source of the salts and other contaminants that have put it into a perpetual death throe.

From a distance, the blue sea shimmers between the barren Chocolate and Santa Rosa mountain ranges, reflecting the sky. But on closer look, the water appears brownish-green, and some of its once-booming beaches are covered with rotting fish and dead barnacles.

Because the sea is a terminal lake, the water leaves by evaporation, which concentrates salts and other contaminants such as pesticide residues and selenium, a naturally occurring chemical common in the Southwest.

``It's the only ecosystem like this in the United States - that's half the problem,'' Horvitz said. ``People don't understand the problems of the sea because it is so unique.''

Horvitz's park was once the most visited in California. After reports of selenium, contaminated fish and other horror stories, its attendance has dropped from over 500,000 people in the mid-1980s to 126,000 last year.

In the 1950s and 1960s, stars like Desi Arnaz and Bob Hope visited Salton City's championship golf course. Thousands more flocked to watch boat races, eat at the first-class restaurants and stay at resort motels.

``The Salton Sea is an underdog,'' said Horvitz, who oversees the 18 miles of state parkland on the northeastern shore. ``Many people have written it off. It needs a champion.''

Even if its creation and continued survival are the result of man, it serves an important purpose for wildlife since most of California's natural wetlands have been taken over by farming and other developments.

``(It's) probably the single greatest place for aquatic wildlife in the state,'' said San Diego State University professor Stuart Hurlbert, whose classes study the Colorado River delta.

As the salinity increases, even rugged saltwater fish like tilapia will not be able to reproduce. With fewer fish, the birds that rely on it will either starve or have to find another place to rest.

The increasing salinity stresses the fish that live there, making them more susceptible to disease. Federal biologists speculate that's what happened this summer when 13,000 birds fell to avian botulism, a toxin that formed in the rotting bellies of sick fish.

Nutrients from the farmland set off another chain reaction, starting with explosive algae growth. When the microscopic organisms die, they consume oxygen and fish suffocate.

Though fish kills and rampant algae have always plagued the sea, few visitors swim in it these days, perhaps scared off by reports of contamination, its rotten-egg odor and dead fish bobbing on the surface.

Instead, the sea is used for boating and fishing, although it's more difficult since the lake's rising levels have submerged most of the boat ramps.

Some residents who live in the dozen communities hugging the sea - populations ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand - are convinced the best plan is to leave if they can.

``You go to school and get out of school and bail from this place,'' said Geoffrey Delt, an 18-year-old senior at West Shores High School. ``There's not much opportunity here. The rent's cheap. That's about it.''

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

Photo: (1) White pelicans rest on a platform on west sho re of Salton Sea. Hundreds of birds have died from eating lake's dying fish.

(2)``One day, these birds will fly in and die here with no place to go. And this will have consequences on the Western Hemisphere, if not the whole world.''

-Norm Niver

Salton Sea resident.

Associated Press