Where the Ghost Bird Sings by the Poison Springs (Cont.)

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Outside Magazine February 2002

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Where the Ghost Bird Sings by the Poison Springs (Cont.)


	Highway 98 revisited: A Sign near the New River spells it out.

POOR JOSÉ ONLY GOT $100. I had to give Ray Garnett, formerly the proprietor of Rayís Salton Sea Guide Service, $500 before heíd consent to take me down the last ten-mile stretch of the New River. Ray had been a fishing guide for decades. Now that he was retired, he still went out on the Sea pretty often, to keep even. He called the Salton Sea the most productive fishery in the world.

"How about the fish, Ray?" I asked.

"Iíve been eatiní íem since 1955, and Iím still here, so thereís nothiní wrong with íem," he replied.

As a matter of fact, he thought the Salton Sea must have improved, because he used to get stinging rashes on his fingers when he cleaned too many fish, and that didnít happen anymore.

About the New River, Ray had very little information. Heíd never been on it in all his 78 years, and neither had anybody else he knew. That was why he was willing to hazard his $800 aluminum water-skimmer with its $1,200 outboard motor on a cruise. He was even a little excited. He kept saying, "This sure is different."

Ray preferred corvina to tilapia, and he brought some home-smoked corvina along in the cooler. Probably I was imagining the aftertaste.

Stocky, red, hairy-handed, round-faced, Ray did everything slowly and right, his old eyes seeing and sometimes not telling. We put the boat in near Westmorland, and the river curved us around the contours of a cantaloupe field, with whitish spheres in the bright greenness, then the brown of a fallow field, a dirt road, and at last the cocoa-brown of the river itself, whirling us away.

Ducks were flitting happily, and we saw dozens of pelicans as we came out into the sea. "You get away from the smell when you get out here fisin'," said Ray, and he was right.

The New Riverís stench was far milder here, the color less alarming; and I remembered how, when Iíd asked Tom Kirk of the Salton Sea Authority how much of the Salton Seaís sickness came from the New River, heíd promptly answered, "People point their fingers at Mexico and at farmers. The perception that the Salton Sea is Mexicoís toilet is unfair."

Maybe he was right, God knows. Maybe something else was causing the fish deaths and the bird deaths.

"You think there are any fish in this river, Ray?" I asked.

"Flathead catfish. I wouldnít eat íem. One time we did core samples of the mud in these wetlands. It has just about everything in it."

"Like what?" I asked, but Ray stayed silent.

A little later, he said, "Must be something wrong with this water, ícause I donít see any bullfrogs. I been watchiní the bank. No turtles, either. Bullfrogs and turtles can live in anything."

Swallows flew down. The river was pleasant, really, wide and coffee-colored, with olive-bleached tamarisk trees on either of its salt-banded banks. We can poison nature and go on poisoning it; something precious always remains. There is always something that our earth has left to give, and we keep right on taking.

Lowering our heads, we passed under a fresh-painted girder bridge that framed a big pipe. There was a sudden faint whiff of sewage, but the river didnít stink a tenth as much as it had at the border, let alone in Mexico. Passing a long straight feeder canal with hardly any trash in it, we found ourselves running between tall green grass and flittering birds. To the northwest, Villager Peak in the Santa Rosa Mountains was a lovely blue ahead of us.

"Have another piece of that corvina," Ray said.

Now there were just hills of bamboo and grass on either side, like the Everglades. Four black-winged pelicans flew together over the grass. The sunken chocolate windings of the New River seemed to get richer and richer. But another smell began to thicken. "The seaís right on the side of these weeds here," Ray was saying.

"Whatís that smell, Ray?"

"I think itís all the dying fish, and dead fish on the bottom. It forms some kind of a gas. Itís just another die-off. Itís natural." Was it? Ducks were flitting happily, and we saw dozens of pelicans as we came out into the sea.

"You get away from the smell when you get out here fishiní," Ray said, and he was right. Out on the greenish-brownish waves—"Thatís algae bloom that made the water turn green. Wonít be any fish in here today"—the only odor was ocean.

"Theyíve had studies and what have you ever since the late fifties," Ray sighed. "In 1995 we put 420 hours in and didnít catch a fish. But in í97 and í98 they started coming back. Whether the fish have gotten more tolerant or whether itís something else, I donít know."

Deep in an orangish-green wave, Ray thought it best to turn around. As we approached the river we grounded on a sandbar.

"If you donít mind getting your feet wet," Ray said, "it sure would make things easier."

We pushed. From the shore came a sickening sweet stench of rotting animals, and I soon had a sore throat and my eyes began to sting. When I left him, Ray gave me a kind and gentle smile, and an entire bag of smoked corvina.

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