Seagrass Presence and Absence Map for South Australia

A seagrass habitat map for South Australia identifies areas of seagrass presence and absence. It was produced by the ACEAS Seagrass working group, integrating multiple data sources including the National Intertidal-Subtidal Benthic Habitat Map and a 2005 UNEP WCMC global survey. The dataset was last updated in April 2026.

Use Cases

• Train a binary classification model to predict seagrass_presence from underlying geospatial raster data.
• Analyze the spatial distribution of seagrass_absence areas to identify potential habitat loss or environmental stressors.
• Integrate the habitat_map layer with other marine datasets for cumulative impact assessment of coastal developments.
• Validate remote sensing algorithms for seagrass detection by comparing model outputs against the mapped presence/absence labels.

Strengths

• Integrates three authoritative sources: the NISB Habitat Map, a 2005 UNEP global survey, and regional publications/reports.
• Provides a clear binary classification (presence/absence) for habitat modeling.
• Managed and updated by the Australian Ocean Data Network, a recognized national data aggregator.

Limitations

• The core UNEP WCMC source data is from 2005, which may not reflect current seagrass extents.
• Specific row/record counts and spatial resolution are not documented.
• Geographic coverage is limited to South Australia, not the entire Australian coastline.

Provenance

Source

ACEAS Seagrass working group, utilizing data from the University of Tasmania's NISB map and UNEP WCMC.

Collection Method

Produced by synthesizing a national benthic habitat map, a global seagrass survey, and regional publications.

Time Range

Source data includes a global survey from 2005; specific temporal coverage for South Australia is not stated.

Freshness

Metadata record was last updated in April 2026, though underlying source data is older.

Geography

South Australia.