Northern California Current Pelagic and Demersal Habitat Survey, 1996-Present

Since 1996, the Northwest Fisheries Science Center has conducted biweekly hydrography and plankton cruises along the Newport Hydrographic line in Oregon. The database stores data from ongoing field collections by the OSU Fisheries Oceanography Research Team in collaboration with NOAA Fisheries, including plankton tows, benthic beam trawls, and water column profiles. This work includes a seasonal survey of young-of-the-year groundfish initiated in FY11.

Use Cases

• Modeling young-of-the-year groundfish distribution based on seasonal survey data mentioned in the description
• Analyzing zooplankton community dynamics based on biweekly plankton sampling
• Studying hydrographic conditions and their influence on fish habitats based on water column profile data
• Investigating pelagic and demersal habitat linkages based on synoptic sampling of fish and plankton

Strengths

• Data collection spans from 1996 to the present, providing a long-term time series
• Surveys cover a defined geographic transect from 1 to 25 miles offshore along the 44.67N line
• Integrates multiple data types: hydrographic measurements, zooplankton samples, and groundfish surveys

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
• The survey was not designed to quantitatively sample the young-of-the-year life history stage

Provenance

Source

Northwest Fisheries Science Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Collection Method

Field collections including plankton tows, benthic beam trawls, hydrographic profiles, and in-situ video observations

Time Range

1996 to present (ongoing)

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-14 22:55:44.535951; freshness should be verified

Geography

Newport Hydrographic line (NH-Line) across the central Oregon shelf (44.67N), U.S. West Coast, northern California Current