Maritimes Summer Research Vessel Surveys

Study Extent

“Summer” cruises occur in May, June, July and August and these focus on the Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy (i.e. 4VWX).Data has been collected from the summers of 1970-2020.

Sampling

Collected data includes total catch in numbers and weights by species. Length frequency data is available for most species, as are the age, sex, maturity and weight information for a subset of the individual animals. When a trawl is hauled, all of the individuals are sorted baskets by species, and the baskets are weighed to get total biomass for a species.
If we have a large catch, some baskets will be kept for detailed sampling and others will be discarded. Only a subset of these are individually weighed, thus there are some occurrences which have a length but no weight. When a trawl is hauled, all of the individuals for a given species are weighed and counted.  These values become  total biomass and individual count.  For huge catches, the individual count is sometimes calculated from the weight. Prior to 1995, they used a spring scale for measuring total weight for a species. It recorded to the nearest kg. Small catches were entered as zero. For many species, you can see Zero as the biomass estimate throughout these years.
Prior to 2005, there are some invertebrate records, but the focus was primarily on commercial species (e.g. scallop, lobster).  The “Strong Effect” shows up in the mid-90’s when Mike Strong insisted they start sorting the sculpins and pouts more carefully and our species count went up. The standard ID guide used is Scott and Scott, Atlantic fishes of Canada, and it appeared in the late 1980’s. The guide available prior to that did not distinguish between Red Hake and White Hake. We can see this in our data. There are inconsistencies in using a separate code for Red Hake before about 1978. It does not have much impact on White Hake, which has a much higher biomass, but it does for Red Hake.
Below 40cm, winter and little skate ID is questionable.

Quality Control

Data are input while at sea using the in-house developed application Groundfish Entry System. Rigorous error checks and warnings are applied and edits take place during sampling in most cases. Further quality assurance checks are applied before loading to the production database. Scientific names associated with resource occurrence records have been mapped to recognized standards - marine taxa have been mapped to the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS). The WoRMS codes, the AphiaIDs have been included as LSIDs in the occurrence record DwC field scientificNameID.

Method steps

1. To prepare this dataset for OBIS Canada publication, data was structured into an OBIS-compatible format using R and laid out in four tables: an Event Core, Occurrence Core and two Extended Measurement of Fact extensions. Defined vocabularies listed on the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Vocabulary Server (NVS) were used whenever possible. Taxon matches were obtained from WoRMS.

1. Actinopterygii
   common name: Ray-finned fishes rank: class
2. Anthozoa
   common name: Sea anemones/Stony Corals/Soft corals rank: class
3. Ascidiacea
   common name: Ascidians/Tunicates/Sea Squirts rank: class
4. Asteroidea
   common name: Sea Stars rank: class
5. Aves
   common name: Birds rank: class
6. Bivalvia
   common name: Bivalve molluscs rank: class
7. Cephalopoda
   common name: Cephalopods rank: class
8. Crinoidea
   common name: Sea lilies rank: class
9. Demospongiae
   common name: Sponges rank: class
10. Echinoidea
    common name: Sea Urchins rank: class
11. Elasmobranchii
    common name: Sharks/Rays/Skates/etc. rank: class
12. Florideophyceae
    common name: Red Algae rank: class
13. Gastropoda
    common name: Snails rank: class
14. Gephyrea
    common name: non-annulated worms rank: class
15. Gymnolaemata
    common name: Bryozoans rank: class
16. Hexactinellida
    common name: Hexactinellid sponges rank: class
17. Hexanauplia
    common name: Copepods/Barnacles/etc. rank: class
18. Holocephali
    common name: Chimaeras rank: class
19. Holothuroidea
    common name: Sea cucumbers rank: class
20. Hydrozoa
    common name: Hydrozoans rank: class
21. Magnoliopsida
    common name: Eel Grass rank: class
22. Malacostraca
    common name: Crabs/Lobsters/Shrimp/Amphipods/Isopods/etc. rank: class
23. Mammalia
    common name: Mammals rank: class
24. Myxini
    common name: Hagfish rank: class
25. Ophiuroidea
    common name: Brittlestars/Basketstars/etc. rank: class
26. Petromyzonti
    common name: Lamprey rank: class
27. Phaeophyceae
    common name: Brown Algae rank: class
28. Polychaeta
    common name: Bristleworms/Polychaetes rank: class
29. Polyplacophora
    common name: Chitons rank: class
30. Pycnogonida
    common name: Sea Spiders rank: class
31. Rhynchonellata
    common name: Brachiopods rank: class
32. Scyphozoa
    common name: True jellies rank: class
33. Staurozoa
    common name: Stalked jellyfish rank: class
34. Thaliacea
    common name: Tunicate rank: class
35. Turbellaria
    common name: Flatworms rank: class
36. Ulvophyceae
    common name: Green Algae rank: class
37. Annelida
    common name: Segmented worms rank: phylum
38. Arthropoda
    common name: Crustaceans rank: phylum
39. Brachiopoda
    common name: Lampshells rank: phylum
40. Bryozoa
    common name: Bryozoans rank: phylum
41. Chordata
    common name: Chordates rank: phylum
42. Coelenterata
    common name: Cnidaria and Ctenophora rank: phylum
43. Ctenophora
    common name: Comb Jellies rank: phylum
44. Echinodermata
    common name: Echinoderms rank: phylum
45. Hemichordata
    common name: Protochordates rank: phylum
46. Mollusca
    common name: Molluscs rank: phylum
47. Nematoda
    common name: Nematodes (round worms) rank: phylum
48. Nemertea
    common name: Ribbon worms rank: phylum
49. Porifera
    common name: Sponges rank: phylum
50. Animalia
    common name: Animals rank: kingdom
51. Plantae
    common name: Plants rank: kingdom

Summer cruises focus on the Scotian Shelf and Bay of Fundy