National Coral Reef Monitoring Program: Benthic Complexity and Urchin Abundance at Climate

NOAA's National Coral Reef Monitoring Program collected benthic complexity and urchin abundance data in the Pacific Remote Island Areas from 2014 to 2018. SCUBA divers conducted visual surveys at stratified random climate stations in hard-bottom habitat at 15-meter depths. The data include substrate height bin tallies and urchin abundance codes recorded using the DACOR system.

Use Cases

• Modeling reef structural complexity based on substrate height bin tallies.
• Analyzing urchin population dynamics based on visual abundance codes (DACOR).
• Assessing coral reef habitat health and resilience across Pacific islands.
• Correlating benthic relief measurements with other environmental monitoring data.

Strengths

• Data collected under a structured national monitoring program (NCRMP).
• Standardized methodology with 30 substrate height measurements per 15-meter transect.
• Clear temporal coverage from 2014 to 2018.
• Specific geographic focus on Pacific Remote Island Areas.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is available only in PDF and HTML formats, which may hinder direct analysis.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Visual surveys by SCUBA divers at NCRMP climate stations, using transects and the DACOR abundance coding system.

Time Range

2014 to 2018

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-14 22:59:30.005678; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Pacific Remote Island Areas