Atlantic Offshore Seabird Catalog: Survey Effort and Observations

The Atlantic Offshore Seabird Dataset Catalog is a compiled database of seabird observations from the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf. It contains over 300,000 records from more than 70 datasets spanning 1906 to 2013, with a curated subset of roughly 260,000 records from 1938-2013 archived at NODC. Each record includes a unique point location, date, time, species, and count, along with potential biological annotations and survey effort data.

Use Cases

• Analyzing seabird species distribution patterns across the Atlantic Coast based on point location and species data.
• Modeling population trends over time using observation counts and date records spanning over a century.
• Assessing survey effort and environmental conditions for offshore planning using transect-level weather variables.
• Studying animal behavior and demographics through biological information such as age or behavior annotations.

Strengths

• Contains a large volume of historical data with over 300,000 observation records.
• Compiles data from multiple authoritative sources including BOEM, USFWS, and USGS.
• Provides detailed metadata for each observation, including unique location, date, time, species, and count.

Limitations

• The dataset's temporal coverage ends in 2013, making it over a decade old.
• Column names and specific data structure are not provided in the available metadata.
• There is a discrepancy in reported record counts: the main database has 'about 300,000' records, while the NODC subset has 'about 260,000'.

Provenance

Source

Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)

Collection Method

Compilation of available seabird observation datasets from the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf.

Time Range

1906-2013

Freshness

The data content is from 2013, though metadata was updated on datagov in 2026.

Geography

Atlantic Coast and Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf, including states from Maine to Georgia.