Bay Scale Assessment of Habitat in Bras d'Or Lake - River Denys 2005 - 2009 data is part of the publication Bay Scale Assessment of Nearshore Habitat Bras d'Or Lakes. A history of nearshore benthic surveys of Bras d’Or Lake from 2005 – 2011 is presented. Early work utilized drop camera and fixed mount sidescan. The next phase was one of towfish development, where camera and sidescan were placed on one platform with transponder-based positioning. From 2009 to 2011 the new towfish was used to ground truth an echosounder. The surveys were performed primarily in the northern half of the lake; from 10 m depth right into the shallows at less than 1 m. Different shorelines could be distinguished from others based upon the relative proportions of substrate types and macrophyte canopy. The vast majority of macrophytes occurred within the first 3 m of depth. This zone was dominated by a thin but consistent cover of eelgrass (Zostera marina L.) on almost all shores with a current or wave regime conducive to the growth of this plant. However, the eelgrass beds were frequently in poor shape and the negative impacts of commonly occurring water column turbidity, siltation, or possible localized eutrophication, are suspected. All survey data were placed into a Geographic Information System, and this document is a guide to that package. The Geographic Information System could be used to answer management questions such as the placement and character of habitat compensation projects, the selection of nearshore protected areas or as a baseline to determine long term changes. Vandermeulen, H. 2016. Video-sidescan and echosounder surveys of nearshore Bras d’Or Lake. Can. Tech. Rep. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 3183: viii + 39 p. Cite this data as: Vandermeulen H. Bay Scale Assessment of Nearshore Habitat Bras d'Or Lake - River Denys 2005 - 2009. Published May 2022. Coastal Ecosystems Science Division, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Dartmouth, N.S.

In 2018 and 2019 Fisheries and Oceans Canada conducted a project to relocate American Eel (Anguilla rostrata) from Port Dalhousie Harbour to mitigate potential impacts of in-water construction prior to and during an essential harbour revitalization project. American Eel are designated as Endangered under the Province of Ontario’s Endangered Species Act and were confirmed to be present in the area during initial sampling efforts of this project. While a combination of passive eel traps and boat electrofishing were used to capture eels, this dataset includes passive capture data only. A total of four eels were captured using eel traps and all individuals were relocated to Hamilton Harbour. Only two of the four eels captured were large enough to be tagged with acoustic transmitters, both of which eventually returned to Port Dalhousie from Hamilton Harbour. All other fish species captured in the traps were identified, counted and released at Port Dalhousie.

This record contains results from stable isotope analysis of sediment samples including δ 13C (‰), δ 15N (‰), total N and total C collected in the Beaufort Sea.

The 1 cm resolution vegetation digital height model was extracted using a bare earth model and digital surface model (DSM) derived from unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) imagery acquired from a single day survey on July 28th 2016, in Cambridge Bay, Nunavut. The mapping product covers 525m2 and was produced by Canada Centre for Remote Sensing /Canada Centre for Mapping and Earth Observation. The UAV survey was completed in collaboration with the Canadian High Arctic Research Station (CHARS) for northern vegetation monitoring research. For more information, refer to our current Arctic vegetation research: Fraser et al; "UAV photogrammetry for mapping vegetation in the low-Arctic" Arctic Science, 2016, 2(3): 79-102. http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/AS-2016-0008

The Canadian Weathership Program collected meteorological data at Station Papa (50N, 145W) in the North Pacific Ocean between 1949 and 1981. In 2014, researchers at the University of Washington (UW) Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) analyzed this historic data to determine its efficacy as a scientific tool. The data available here are the Government of Canada data files that were utilized for this analysis. The "OWSP Full Data (1949-1981)" file contains the entire Canadian Weathership Program record of data collected from Station Papa and the "OWSP Daily Averaged Wind Speed and Wave Height Data (1949-1981)" file contains daily averaged values of wind speed and wave height generated by the UW APL and NOAA PMEL researchers. The Data Dictionary for each data file contains notes on any quality controls that were applied to the data by the UW APL and NOAA PMEL researchers. The UW documents titled, "Data Documentation for Dataset 1170 (DSI-1170), Surface Marine Data, National Climatic Data Center" (https://digital.lib.washington.edu/researchworks/bitstream/handle/1773/25570/td1170.pdf?sequence=6&isAllowed=y) and "Table detailing units of data values in each file" (https://digital.lib.washington.edu/researchworks/handle/1773/25570), provide further information on the key values, point scales, and other units that were used in these datasets.

Bay-scale empirical demonstrations of how bivalve aquaculture alters plankton composition, and subsequently ecological functioning and higher trophic levels, are lacking. Temporal, inter- and within-bay variation in hydrodynamic, environmental, and aquaculture pressure limit efficient plankton monitoring design to detect bay-scale changes and inform aquaculture ecosystem interactions. Here, we used flow cytometry to investigate spatio-temporal variations in bacteria and phytoplankton (< 20 µm) composition in four bivalve aquaculture embayments. We observed higher abundances of bacteria and phytoplankton in shallow embayments that experienced greater freshwater and nutrient inputs. Depleted nutrient conditions may have led to the dominance of picophytoplankton cells, which showed strong within-bay variation as a function of riverine vs freshwater influence and nutrient availability. Although environmental forcings appeared to be a strong driver of spatio-temporal trends, results showed that bivalve aquaculture may reduce near-lease phytoplankton abundance and favor bacterial growth. We discuss aquaculture pathways of effects such as grazing, benthic-pelagic coupling processes, and microbial biogeochemical cycling. Conclusions provide guidance on optimal sampling considerations using flow cytometry in aquaculture sites based on embayment geomorphology and hydrodynamics. Cite this data as: Sharpe H, Lacoursière-Roussel A, Barrell J (2024). Monitoring bay-scale bivalve aquaculture ecosystem interactions using flow cytometry. Version 1.2. Fisheries and Oceans Canada. Samplingevent dataset. https://ipt.iobis.org/obiscanada/resource?r=monitoring_bay-scale_bivalve_aquaculture_ecosystem_interactions_using_flow_cytometry&v=1.2

The Beaufort Regional Environmental Assessment-Marine Fishes Project (2012-2014) and Canadian Beaufort Sea-Marine Ecosystem Assessment (CBS-MEA, 2017-present) conducted by Fisheries and Oceans Canada provide offshore surveys of marine fishes and ecosystems on the Canadian Beaufort Shelf and slope in August and early September. The projects focus on integrating oceanography, food web linkages, physical-biological couplings and spatial and inter-annual variability, within the context of ongoing climate-driven change including enhanced Ocean Acidification. Sampling was conducted from the F/V Frosti at stations along transects spanning 20-1000 m. Zooplankton was collected using a bongo or multi-net system in conjunction with oceanographic and biogeochemical sampling.

The National Ecological Framework for Canada's "Total Land and Water Area by Ecozone” dataset provides land and water area values for ecozone framework polygons, in hectares. It includes attributes for a polygon’s total area, land-only area and large water body area.

A coastal surficial substrate layer for the coastal Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy. To create the layer, previous geological characterizations from NRCan were translated into consistent substrate and habitat characterizations; including surficial grain size and primary habitat type. In areas where no geological description was available, data including digital elevation models and substrate samples from NRCan, CHS and DFO Science were interpreted to produce a regional scale substrate and habitat characterization. Each characterization in the layer was given a ranking of confidence and original data resolution to ensure that decision makers are informed of the quality and scale of data that went into each interpretation. Cite this data as: Greenlaw, M., Harvey, C. Data of: A substrate classification for the Inshore Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy, Maritimes Region. Published: March 2022. Coastal Ecosystems Science Division, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, St. Andrews, N.B. https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/f2c493e4-ceaa-11eb-be59-1860247f53e3

Effective fisheries and habitat management processes require knowledge of the distribution of areas of high ecological or biological significance. On the Scotian Shelf and Slope, a number of benthic ecologically or biologically significant areas consisting of habitat-forming species such as sponges and deep-water corals have been identified. However, knowledge of their spatial distribution is largely based on targeted surveys that are limited in their spatial extent. We used a species distribution modelling approach called random forest (RF) to predict the probability of occurrence and biomass of sponges, sea pens, and large and small gorgonian corals across the entire spatial extent of Fisheries and Oceans Canada’s (DFO) Maritimes Region. We also modelled the rare sponge Vazella pourtalesi, which forms the largest known aggregation of its kind on the Scotian Shelf. We utilized a number of data sources including DFO multispecies trawl catch data and in situ benthic imagery observations. Most models had excellent predictive capacity with cross-validated Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristic Curve (AUC) values ranging from 0.760 to 0.977. Areas of suitable habitat were identified for each taxon and were contrasted against their known distribution and when applicable, the location of closure areas designated for their protection. Generalized additive models (GAMs) were developed to predict the biomass distribution of each taxonomic group and serve as a comparison to the RF models. The RF and GAM models provided comparable results, although GAMs provided superior predictions of biomass along the continental slope for some taxonomic groups. In the absence of data observations, the results of this study could be used to identify the potential distribution of sensitive benthic taxa for use in fisheries and habitat management applications. These results could also be used to refine significant concentrations of these taxa as identified through the kernel density analyses. Cite this data as: Beazley, Lindsay; Kenchington, Ellen; Murillo-Perez, Javier; Lirette, Camille; Guijarro-Sabaniel, Javier; McMillan, Andrew; Knudby, Anders (2019). Species Distribution Modelling of Corals and Sponges in the Maritimes Region for Use in the Identification of Significant Benthic Areas. Published July 2023. Ocean Ecosystems Science Division, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Dartmouth, N.S. https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/356e92f3-5bf3-4810-98b1-3e10cd7742aa