Türkiye’s lakes are drying up
The country faces an ecological crisis as its wetlands disappear.
On a dusty August afternoon in Anatolia, Niğmet Sezen and Ali Erefe stand on the edge of a concrete dock that looks out onto fields of dried thistles and scrubby grass, a hot wind whistling through the plain. Far in the distance, two sky-blue objects perch in the middle of the field, almost too far from where Niğmet and Ali stand to see clearly. But they know exactly what they are looking at: abandoned rowboats, adrift in the middle of a vast grassland that not so long ago was a lake.
Marmara Lake once spread across 17.2 square miles in Türkiye’s southwest province of Manisa. Tourists came from around the country to boats on its waters, which were flush with nearly 20,000 birds—great white pelicans, whiskered terns, cormorants, flamingoes. But in 2011, the lake began to dry up, and by 2021, it had lost 98 percent of its surface area, decimating the local ecosystem that depended on the water.
Niğmet and Ali are both from the village of Tekelioğlu, which abutted the lake. Niğmet fished in its waters, she reminisces, eating what she caught. Ali learned to swim in Marmara Lake when he was a kid; the last time he swam there was in 2018. “I miss it all the time,” Ali says. “The new children of the village don’t know how to swim.”
Marmara is just one of Türkiye’s iconic lakes that are rapidly disappearing after years of destructive agricultural and damming practices. So far, 186 of the 250 lakes have dried up in the last 50 years, with many quickly shrinking in the last decade—a massive ecological disaster and an existential threat that shows no sign of slowing down. Some 1.5 million hectares of wetland have also dried up in that time. A recent United Nations report says that Türkiye is at risk of entering severe drought by 2030, with 88 percent of the country is at risk of desertification.
Some lakes have receded enough to reveal architectural wonders previously hidden underwater, including the Byzantine Basilica of Saint Neophytos, recently visited by Pope Leo XIV on his recent visit to Türkiye.
The causes are mostly man-made and exacerbated by drought: for decades, lake water has been diverted via dams to thirsty crops and to mining projects. For instance, part of what doomed Marmara Lake was the opening, more than a decade ago, of the Gördes Dam, which rerouted water for agricultural irrigation. Now, the lake is bone dry, and there is not enough rain to refill it.
As freshwater bodies in Türkiye evaporate—leaving toxic dust and salinized soil behind—endemic species also vanish. The loss of lakes destroys the delicate ecosystems around them and disrupts the food sources and flight patterns of migratory birds.
There were warning bells ringing for Marmara Lake for many years. Dicle Tuba Kılıç is the Chairperson of the Board of Directors of the Doğa Derneği (in English, the Nature Association), an organization that works to protect key biodiversity areas in Türkiye, including habitats for endangered birds and wetlands. In 2006, the organization undertook an analysis of threats to Türkiye’s biodiversity and saw clearly that places like Marmara Lake were at risk of going dry. When the situation accelerated in 2021, they initiated a communications campaign to get the word out and raise awareness through press releases, podcasts, social media, and public television.
“The usage of water is never decreased, and agriculture is increased. And so we have lost so many lakes and wetlands,” says Dicle. “All the agriculture started to use underground water, which will also not be enough for the long term. So this is a catastrophic situation, this is a water crisis.”
Some of the lakes haven’t dried up completely, but are on their way. Lake Eğirdir in the Lakes Region has receded, making it prone to dangerous blooms of algae and mucilage. Lake Van, the largest body of water in Türkiye, has seen its shoreline shrink, revealing manmade junk from years of pollution as well as ancient ruins once submerged underwater. Seyfe Lake had the largest flamingo population in Türkiye, with over 200,000 birds, but recently, a project was approved to build a gold mine near the dwindling lake, despite the fact it's a protected sanctuary. The Salt Lake (Tuz Gӧlü) also had a flamingo population, but it became a graveyard when it dried up, with the parched lakebed filled with the carcasses of dead birds. In the Konya basin in central Anatolia, illegal depletion of the groundwater is leading to massive sinkholes. Out east, Lake Kuyucuk hangs on by a thread, its endemic bird populations—including white-headed ducks and ruddy shelducks—in disarray.
The seeds of this catastrophe were sown a long time ago, when Türkiye began building dams in the 1950s. “Large irrigation projects were started which were part of the developmentalist agenda of Türkiye, because irrigation projects, dams, canals for irrigation, bring the water into the agricultural lands from the dams,” says Uygar Ӧzesmi, founder of Good4Trust.org, an organization promoting ecological sustainability and an alternative model for the consumption economy. “So it is a legacy of what you could call the dam era.”
That era continued in earnest until about 10 years ago, and though it has slowed, it hasn’t stopped. What’s happening to the lakes is partially the maturation of the dam projects. Building dams disrupts the river systems and cuts off the connection to the wetlands, which leads to the wetlands slowly drying up.
“We build dams, either constructed dams, constant concrete systems, or temporary soil dams during the irrigation season, and all these hydrological interventions aim to collect water for irrigation. When we do that, we need to ensure environmental flow for nature. However, in most cases, in order to meet irrigation demand, environmental flow is not maintained,” says Eren Atak, Freshwater Program Manager at World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Türkiye. The organization began predicting the lake disaster over 20 years ago, when many of the lakes first started dramatically drying out. They saw the trend of wetlands being converted into agricultural land, as well as the inefficient use of flood irrigation to water the fields and the projections for future climate change and drought.
Roughly 77 percent of water usage in Türkiye is for agriculture, and practices in the country have become less sustainable and more water-intensive, according to Atak and the Turkish government. Historically, crops that required lower levels of water—like chickpeas or lentils or wheat—were grown, but many farmers have shifted to growing water-thirsty crops like corn, sugar beets, and avocadoes.
“The places where chickpeas and lentils used to be grown now don't grow chickpeas,” laments Dr. Erol Kesici, a retired faculty member of Süleyman Demirel University's Eğirdir Faculty of Fisheries and a founding member of the Su Enstitüsü (Water Institute). “They come from Canada for 50 lira; if you try to buy chickpeas [grown] here, you can't get them for 150 lira.
”Further exacerbating the problem are illegal wells dug by farmers to access the groundwater as they seek more sources of irrigation for their fields at the expense of nearby wetlands. If the lakes and wetlands aren’t fed by their natural source they will diminish. When combined with the persistent drought across Türkiye, the situation deteriorates rapidly. And when the lakes dry out, says Uygar Ӧzesmi, “that just essentially means death, right?”
There are also few restrictions on mining in Türkiye, which demands an immense amount of freshwater to function. In July, the Turkish Grand National Assembly passed a bill that opened up olive groves and other protected pasture lands to mining activity.
“You pollute thousands of liters of water just to extract a gram of gold,” Erol Kesici says.
Though the numbers are particularly dire in Türkiye, the problem is global. In 2023, scientists at the University of Virginia published a report showing more than 50 percent of the world’s largest natural lakes and reservoirs were losing water. According to the report, about a quarter of the global population lives in the basin of a drying lake. The Caspian Sea, the Aral Sea, Lake Mead, the Great Salt Lake, and many others throughout the world have all shrunk significantly, leading to increased aridification of the surrounding area, which causes more water to evaporate. Water quality decreases, toxic algae blooms, and wildlife dies in a drastic feedback cycle.
After Marmara Lake dried out, the animal farming in the area collapsed. Villagers, unable to support themselves with agriculture or fishing or tourism, started to leave. One man who remains behind in the village scrolled through pictures on his phone of the lake; in one, he hefts two giant fish in front of the vast blue expanse of water where now there is none. The worn white building that housed the fishermen’s cooperative and the fish market at the shore of the lake is abandoned, like the ruins of some ancient civilization that thrived only a few years ago. Along the road there are still signs that warn drivers they are entering the water area, with lettering that is sun-worn and gray. But there is no water. The lack is palpable, physical.
Niğmet and Ali climb to the top of a birdwatching tower that once looked out over the expanse of the lake; the signage showing some of the lake’s once-endemic birds still stands at the base of the structure. From the pinnacle, the two have a perfect view of what was once Marmara Lake. They stand quietly, gazing out over this changed and empty land.
Niğmet has been badly affected by the lake drying up. She holds onto hope, though—she has to. Her hope is a bulwark against her despair.
Looking out at the empty lake bed, “I feel dead inside,” Niğmet says. “The lakes dry up, and today it’s our problem. Tomorrow, it’s the world’s problem.”
