Around the planet, from China to the Bolivian region that borders with Chile, lakes have turned into a gauge of human incidence on the geography: as they dry up and shrink, the water and the basins’ surroundings change in shape and color until they transform into altogether different places. These sites acquire different colorings, some spots rise, some sink, erode or flood in unforeseeable configurations. The regions they ascribe to also change. Sometimes the previously warm color tones of a patch of land with a lake at the center become dotted with cold hues when the lake disappears. Sometimes an area where the blue reflection of water covered everything in green and violet, turns yellowish and red as the center of the lake dries up. The desiccation of a lake acts like a domino spreading its reach the way the pieces topple one another, until the most remote one falls: provinces, regions, districts, counties, and entire states are affected by the decrease in the water level of a lagoon. [...]
Desiccation
in ENCYCLOPEDIA