Adelie Penguin Colony Boundaries on Shirley Island, Antarctica, 2006

An ArcGIS shapefile layer shows the extent of all extant and relic Adelie penguin colonies on Shirley Island, Windmill Islands, from February 2006. Positional accuracy is approximately 1-2 meters, achieved using a Trimble Pro XH differential GPS. The data were collected as part of the ASAC project 1219 after the 2005/06 breeding season.

Use Cases

• Analyze historical colony extents and changes based on the 'Status' field (extant, relic, maximum).
• Model penguin habitat suitability based on precise colony boundary polygons.
• Integrate colony data with a linked Digital Elevation Model (DEM) for topographic analysis.
• Monitor long-term population dynamics in the Windmill Islands region.

Strengths

• High positional accuracy of 1-2 meters, with boundaries identified to within 0.5 meters.
• Includes three distinct colony status categories (extant, relic, maximum) for temporal analysis.
• Data collection was part of a formal scientific project (ASAC_1219).

Limitations

• Last updated 2006-02 27 23:59:59.999000; freshness should be verified.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

AU_AADC via nasa_earthdata

Collection Method

Field mapping using a Trimble Pro XH differential GPS after the breeding season.

Time Range

February 2006, reflecting the 2005/06 breeding season.

Freshness

Last updated 2006-02-27 23:59:59.999000

Geography

Shirley Island, Windmill Islands, Antarctica.