Latest Articles from Biodiversity Data Journal Latest 13 Articles from Biodiversity Data Journal https://bdj.pensoft.net/ Thu, 28 Mar 2024 20:21:31 +0200 Pensoft FeedCreator https://bdj.pensoft.net/i/logo.jpg Latest Articles from Biodiversity Data Journal https://bdj.pensoft.net/ Long-term monitoring of the fish community in the Minho Estuary (NW Iberian Peninsula) https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/112217/ Biodiversity Data Journal 12: e112217

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.12.e112217

Authors: Allan Souza, Martina Ilarri, Ester Dias, Mário Araújo, António Roleira, Ana Catarina Braga, Ana Rita Carvalho, Micaela Mota, Maria Helena Correia, Ana Lages, Ana Moura, Carlos Antunes

Abstract: The paper presents an extensive fish sampling dataset spanning a long-term period from 2010 to 2019. The data were collected in Lenta Marina, an upstream area in the Minho Estuary of the NW Iberian Peninsula, which belongs to a LTSER (Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research) platform. To capture fish, fyke nets were utilised as the sampling method and deployed at Lenta Marina. This dataset offers valuable insights into the abundance of each collected taxa recorded over time.The dataset reports a comprehensive compilation of data on the abundance of fish species observed in the area during the sampling period (includes zeroes when a given taxonomic entity was absent in a given sampling event). It provides a detailed record of the abundances of the fish community through time in a frequent sampling regime (on average, sampling was done every 6 days). The dataset shows that the amount of fish from invasive taxa exceeds the count of fish from native taxa in the Minho Estuary.

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Data Paper Fri, 8 Mar 2024 09:20:21 +0200
MONICET: The Azores whale watching contribution to cetacean monitoring https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/106991/ Biodiversity Data Journal 11: e106991

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.11.e106991

Authors: Laura González García, Marc Fernández, José Azevedo

Abstract: The Azores islands have been historically linked to cetaceans, becoming an example of a successful transition from whaling to whale watching. Twenty-eight cetacean species have been sighted in these waters, making the archipelago one of the most recognised whale and dolphin watching destinations worldwide. The business is well-established in the region, operates in four of the nine islands year-round or seasonally and provides an excellent opportunity to collect long term information on cetacean distribution and abundance in an affordable way. Continuous monitoring is indeed essential to establish baseline knowledge and to evaluate cetacean response to potential natural or anthropogenic impacts. Opportunistic data greatly complement traditional dedicated surveys, providing additional support for appropriate management plans.The MONICET platform has been running continuously since 2009 as a collaborative instrument to collect, store, organise and disseminate cetacean data voluntarily collected by whale watching companies in the Azores. In the period covered by this dataset (2009-2020), 11 whale watching companies have voluntarily provided data from the four islands of the archipelago where whale watching takes place. The dataset contains more than 37,000 sightings of 25 species (22 cetaceans and three turtles). This manuscript presents the first long-term whale watching cetacean occurrence dataset openly available for the Azores. We explain the methodology used for data collection and address the potential biases and limitations inherent to the opportunistic nature of the dataset to maximise its usability by external users.

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Data Paper Tue, 8 Aug 2023 18:17:30 +0300
Biotopes of the intertidal zone in Clarence Island (south of the Strait of Magellan) https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/105726/ Biodiversity Data Journal 11: e105726

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.11.e105726

Authors: Cristian Aldea, Cristina Hernández, Leslie Novoa, Francisco Olivera, Christian Haeger, Nadja Bello

Abstract: The characteristics of the Strait of Magellan promote the formation of unique environments, with diverse habitats and marine organisms. This fragmentation of the landscape generates diverse little-explored ecological associations, especially in the zone of sub-Antarctic islands of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago. One way to address this lack of knowledge is through the biotope characterization methodology, with ecological units composed of the habitat and the communities associated with these environments, obtaining data and information on the dominant and incidental taxonomic groups. This is a good research model to conduct baseline studies in coastal benthic marine environments.A data set in Darwin Core standard is presented of the species that make up the intertidal biotopes of Clarence Island (Tierra del Fuego Archipelago, south of the Strait of Magellan). This includes 50 identified species and the specific coordinates for each sampled location, with a total of 1400 georeferenced records. Mollusks were the most diverse taxon with 21 species, followed by algae (14 species). Sessile organisms such as the barnacles Elminius kingii and Austromegabalanus psittacus predominate in these ecosystems, followed by bivalve mollusks such as Choromytilus chorus and Mytilus chilensis, which together with Nacella magellanica and the alga Hildenbrandia sp. make up more than 50% of the total records. The inclusion of biotope patterns in this study complements the information on benthic marine flora and fauna in the intertidal zone, including new records for the coast in the Clarence Island area, which is within the boundary of the Kawésqar National Park.

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Data Paper Wed, 5 Jul 2023 08:36:31 +0300
Current distribution of Zostera seagrass meadows along the Bulgarian Black Sea coast (SW Black Sea, Bulgaria) (2010-2020) https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/78942/ Biodiversity Data Journal 10: e78942

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.10.e78942

Authors: Dimitar Berov, Stefania Klayn, Diana Deyanova, Ventzislav Karamfilov

Abstract: The current distribution of Zostera spp. seagrass meadows along the Bulgarian Black Sea coast was studied. We used a combination of historical and recent observations of the habitat along the studied coastline. Remote sensing data (satellite images, sonar side-scans) was groundtruthed with georeferenced drop camera observations, scuba diving sampling and georeferenced scuba diving photo and video transects.Тhe total area of the habitat type ‘MB548 - Black Sea seagrass meadows on lower infralittoral sands’ (EUNIS habitat type list 2019) in the study area is 916.9 ha, of which only 17.9 ha are in man-made sheltered environments (harbours). All seagrass meadows identified in 1978-79 were also located during the current survey, despite the increased eutrophication pressure and overall degradation of benthic habitats in the western Black Sea during the 1980s and early 1990s.

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Data Paper Wed, 9 Feb 2022 16:15:00 +0200
Reef benthos of Seychelles - A field guide https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/65970/ Biodiversity Data Journal 9: e65970

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.9.e65970

Authors: Nico Fassbender, Paris Stefanoudis, Zoleka Filander, Gilberte Gendron, Christopher Mah, Lydiane Mattio, Jeanne Mortimer, Carlos Moura, Toufiek Samaai, Kaveh Samimi-Namin, Daniel Wagner, Rowana Walton, Lucy Woodall

Abstract: During the 2019 First Descent Seychelles Expedition, a variety of underwater technologies were deployed to survey the benthic flora and fauna of Seychelles Outer Islands’ shallow to deeper reefs. Submersibles, remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), and SCUBA diving teams used stereo-video camera systems to record benthic communities during transect surveys conducted at 10 m, 30 m, 60 m, 120 m, 250 m and 350 m depths. In total, ~45hrs of video footage was collected during benthic transect surveys, which was subsequently processed using annotation software in order to assess reef biodiversity and community composition. Here, we present a photographic guide for the visual identification of the marine plants, corals and other common invertebrates that inhabit Seychelles’ reefs. It is hoped that the resulting guide will aid marine biologists, conservationists, managers, divers, and naturalists with the identification of organisms as seen in underwater footage or live in the field.A total of 188 morphospecies were identified belonging to Octocorallia (47), Porifera (35), Scleractinia (32), Asteroidea (19), Echinoidea (10), Actiniaria (9), Chlorophyta (8), Antipatharia (6), Hydrozoa (6), Holothuroidea (5), Mollusca (2), Rhodophyta (2), Tracheophyta (2), Annelida (1), Crinoidea (1), Ctenophora (1), Ochrophyta (1), and Zoantharia (1). This represents the first attempt to catalogue the benthic diversity of reefs to 350 m depth in Seychelles.

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Taxonomy & Inventories Fri, 27 Aug 2021 14:00:00 +0300
Sponge-dwelling fauna: a review of known species from the Northwest Tropical Atlantic coral reefs https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/63372/ Biodiversity Data Journal 9: e63372

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.9.e63372

Authors: Antar Pérez-Botello, Nuno Simões

Abstract: Within tropical shallow-water coral reefs, marine sponges provide microhabitats for a wide range of fauna. Although there have been numerous studies and reports of symbiotic relationships among sponges and their associated fauna, those pieces of information are isolated and disconnected. For this reason, based on the available literature, we compiled a species-interaction dataset of coral reefs marine sponge guest known to date. We introduce a dataset that includes 69 articles that report 92 species of sponge hosts clustered in 12 Orders having a guest/host interaction with 300 guest species from 6 Phyla present in the Northwestern Tropical Atlantic coral reefs. This dataset consists of two types of information: 1. A machine-readable data and 2. A human-readable data. These two types of coding improve the scope of the dataset and facilitates the link between machine platforms and human friendly displays. We also created an interactive visualization of the interactions data-matrix and of a dynamic Chord Diagram of the host-guest species connections to generate a user-friendly link between the humans and the dataset.

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Data Paper Mon, 15 Mar 2021 14:45:00 +0200
An open-source, citizen science and machine learning approach to analyse subsea movies https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/60548/ Biodiversity Data Journal 9: e60548

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.9.e60548

Authors: Victor Anton, Jannes Germishuys, Per Bergström, Mats Lindegarth, Matthias Obst

Abstract: This paper describes a data system to analyse large amounts of subsea movie data for marine ecological research. The system consists of three distinct modules for data management and archiving, citizen science, and machine learning in a high performance computation environment. It allows scientists to upload underwater footage to a customised citizen science website hosted by Zooniverse, where volunteers from the public classify the footage. Classifications with high agreement among citizen scientists are then used to train machine learning algorithms. An application programming interface allows researchers to test the algorithms and track biological objects in new footage. We tested our system using recordings from remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) in a Marine Protected Area, the Kosterhavet National Park in Sweden. Results indicate a strong decline of cold-water corals in the park over a period of 15 years, showing that our system allows to effectively extract valuable occurrence and abundance data for key ecological species from underwater footage. We argue that the combination of citizen science tools, machine learning, and high performance computers are key to successfully analyse large amounts of image data in the future, suggesting that these services should be consolidated and interlinked by national and international research infrastructures.Novel information system to analyse marine underwater footage.

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Software Description Wed, 24 Feb 2021 16:30:00 +0200
Long-term mark-recapture and growth data for large-sized migratory brown trout (Salmo trutta) from Lake Mjøsa, Norway https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/52157/ Biodiversity Data Journal 8: e52157

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.8.e52157

Authors: S. Jannicke Moe, Chloé Nater, Atle Rustadbakken, L. Asbjørn Vøllestad, Espen Lund, Tore Qvenild, Ola Hegge, Per Aass

Abstract:

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Data Paper Thu, 28 May 2020 10:00:00 +0300
Building a database for long-term monitoring of benthic macrofauna in the Pertuis-Charentais (2004-2014) https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/10288/ Biodiversity Data Journal 5: e10288

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.5.e10288

Authors: Anne Philippe, Christine Plumejeaud-Perreau, Jérôme Jourde, Philippe Pineau, Nicolas Lachaussée, Emmanuel Joyeux, Frédéric Corre, Philippe Delaporte, Pierrick Bocher

Abstract:

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Data Paper Thu, 12 Jan 2017 14:52:21 +0200
Macrobenthic molluscs from a marine - lagoonal environmental transition in Lesvos Island (Greece) https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/9541/ Biodiversity Data Journal 4: e9541

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.4.e9541

Authors: Athanasios Evagelopoulos, Drosos Koutsoubas, Vasilis Gerovasileiou, Nikolaos Katsiaras

Abstract:

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Data Paper Tue, 1 Nov 2016 16:56:23 +0200
ReefMedMol: Mollusca from the infralittoral rocky shores - the biocoenosis of photophilic algae - in the Mediterranean Sea https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/7516/ Biodiversity Data Journal 4: e7516

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.4.e7516

Authors: Dimitris Poursanidis, Drosos Koutsoubas, Christos Arvanitidis, Giorgos Chatzigeorgiou

Abstract:

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Data Paper Tue, 1 Nov 2016 12:05:44 +0200
Abyssal fauna of the UK-1 polymetallic nodule exploration claim, Clarion-Clipperton Zone, central Pacific Ocean: Echinodermata https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/7251/ Biodiversity Data Journal 4: e7251

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.4.e7251

Authors: Adrian Glover, Helena Wiklund, Muriel Rabone, Diva Amon, Craig Smith, Tim O'Hara, Christopher Mah, Thomas Dahlgren

Abstract: We present data from a DNA taxonomy register of the abyssal benthic Echinodermata collected as part of the Abyssal Baseline (ABYSSLINE) environmental survey cruise ‘AB01’ to the UK Seabed Resources Ltd (UKSRL) polymetallic-nodule exploration claim ‘UK-1’ in the eastern Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ), central Pacific Ocean abyssal plain. Morphological and genetic data are presented for 17 species (4 Asteroidea, 4 Crinoidea, 2 Holothuroidea and 7 Ophiuroidea) identified by a combination of morphological and genetic data. No taxa matched previously published genetic sequences, but 8 taxa could be assigned to previously-described species based on morphology, although here we have used a precautionary approach in taxon assignments to avoid over-estimating species ranges. The Clarion-Clipperton Zone is a region undergoing intense exploration for potential deep-sea mineral extraction. We present these data to facilitate future taxonomic and environmental impact study by making both data and voucher materials available through curated and accessible biological collections.

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Taxonomy & Inventories Mon, 25 Jan 2016 13:59:46 +0200
Polytraits: A database on biological traits of marine polychaetes https://bdj.pensoft.net/article/1024/ Biodiversity Data Journal 2: e1024

DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.2.e1024

Authors: Sarah Faulwetter, Vasiliki Markantonatou, Christina Pavloudi, Nafsika Papageorgiou, Kleoniki Keklikoglou, Eva Chatzinikolaou, Evangelos Pafilis, Georgios Chatzigeorgiou, Katerina Vasileiadou, Thanos Dailianis, Lucia Fanini, Panayota Koulouri, Christos Arvanitidis

Abstract: The study of ecosystem functioning – the role which organisms play in an ecosystem – is becoming increasingly important in marine ecological research. The functional structure of a community can be represented by a set of functional traits assigned to behavioural, reproductive and morphological characteristics. The collection of these traits from the literature is however a laborious and time-consuming process, and gaps of knowledge and restricted availability of literature are a common problem. Trait data are not yet readily being shared by research communities, and even if they are, a lack of trait data repositories and standards for data formats leads to the publication of trait information in forms which cannot be processed by computers. This paper describes Polytraits (http://polytraits.lifewatchgreece.eu), a database on biological traits of marine polychaetes (bristle worms, Polychaeta: Annelida). At present, the database contains almost 20,000 records on morphological, behavioural and reproductive characteristics of more than 1,000 marine polychaete species, all referenced by literature sources. All data can be freely accessed through the project website in different ways and formats, both human-readable and machine-readable, and have been submitted to the Encyclopedia of Life for archival and integration with trait information from other sources.

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Data Paper Fri, 17 Jan 2014 08:50:58 +0200