Maritimes Summer Research Vessel Survey: Fish Catch and Biological Data

Summer missions in June, July, and August focus on the Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy, with recent expansion to the Laurentian Channel and Georges Bank. The dataset includes total catch in numbers and weights by species, with length frequency data for most species and age, sex, maturity, and weight for a subset of individuals. Data is published by the Population Ecology Division of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, with a citation date of January 2021.

Use Cases

• Modeling fish population dynamics based on total catch numbers and weights by species.
• Analyzing species size distributions based on length frequency data.
• Studying biological characteristics like age, sex, and maturity for demographic analysis.
• Mapping survey coverage and catch data based on the geospatial file formats provided.

Strengths

• Includes multiple biological variables: total catch, length frequency, and individual age, sex, maturity, and weight.
• Covers multiple geographic areas: Scotian Shelf, Bay of Fundy, Laurentian Channel, and Georges Bank.
• Data is available in multiple formats including CSV and geospatial formats (ESRI REST, FGDB/GDB).

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Some collected data, such as ageing material and stomach contents, are stored elsewhere and not in this dataset.

Provenance

Source

Population Ecology Division, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Dartmouth, N.S.

Collection Method

Collected during summer research vessel surveys.

Time Range

Surveys occur in May, June, July, and August.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-24 08:36:59.291462; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Scotian Shelf, Bay of Fundy (4VWX 5Yb), Laurentian Channel, Georges Bank (5Zc).