Mono Lake is one of the most unusual lakes in North America and considered to be one of the oldest in the western hemisphere. It is believed that the lake was formed over 750,000 years ago and sediments located below the ash layer suggest that Mono Lake could be a remnant of a larger and older lake that once covered a large part of Nevada and Utah.

The hyper salinity and high alkalinity of the lake, means that no fish are native to the lake. The lake is famous for a tiny species of brine shrimp that are found nowhere else on earth. During the warm summer months, an estimated 4 to 6 trillion inhabit the lake. Brine shrimp are not eaten by humans, but are an important food source for the millions of birds that migrate to the region.

Mono Lake is known as an important resting and eating stop for migratory shorebirds with nearly 2 million waterbirds and 35 species of shorebirds depending on Mono Lake to rest and eat at least part of every year. A few species spend several months nesting in Mono Lake and California gulls nest there and in the Great Salt Lake in Utah.

Mono Lake is absolutely stunning in its raw beauty and is immense in size, filling a natural basin with approximately 695 square miles in size. The most distinctive features of Mono Lake are the eerie and unusual “Tufa” towers, which are mineral structures created when fresh water springs bubble to the surface through the alkaline waters of the lake.

We visited Mono Lake’s South Tufa beach and while we didn’t see any brine shrimp along the shore line, there were hundreds of alkali flies, which live along the shores of the lake and walk underwater encased in small air bubbles to graze and lay their eggs. If you are in the area of Highway 395 south of Reno and north of Mammoth we highly recommend you stop and take the tour at the South Tufa, where you will see one of the largest Tufa groves on the lake. Be sure to take your camera or no one will believe how truly unusual this wondrous place is!