Salt lakes, like the Dead Sea (Israel-Jordan-Palestine) and the Great Salt lake, Utah (USA), are landlocked water bodies with a concentration of salts and other minerals higher than freshwater lakes.
Natural salt pans or salt flats are flat expanses of ground covered with salt and other minerals, usually shining white under the sun. They are found in deserts and are natural formations (unlike salt evaporation ponds, which are artificial).
Evaporation ponds are artificial ponds with very large surface areas that are designed to efficiently evaporate water by sunlight and exposure to the ambient temperatures. Salt evaporation ponds produce salt from seawater and are also man-made.
A brine pool is a large area of brine on the ocean basin. These pools are bodies of water that have a salinity three to five times greater than the surrounding ocean. For deep-sea brine pools, the source of the salt is the dissolution of large salt deposits through salt tectonics. The brine often contains high concentrations of methane, providing energy to chemosynthetic animals that live near the pool.
Salt rivers usually flow into salt lakes. Little is known about salinity ranges and seasonal variations, however the presence of at least one halophilic species has been observed.
Salt river - Arizona. Photo under creative commons licence. Owner : Bernard Gagnon.
Halophiles are reported from more peculiar environments like the human gut, and fermented foods.
Budu sauce. Photo under creative commons licence. Owner : Yosri.