CABIN Canadian Aquatic Biomonitoring Network

The Canadian Aquatic Biomonitoring Network (CABIN) is an aquatic biomonitoring program for assessing the health of fresh water ecosystems in Canada. Benthic macroinvertebrates are collected at a site location and their counts are used as an indicator of the health of that water body.

CABIN is based on the network of networks approach that promotes inter-agency collaboration and data-sharing to achieve consistent and comparable reporting on fresh water quality and aquatic ecosystem conditions in Canada. The program is maintained by Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) to support the collection, assessment, reporting and distribution of biological monitoring information. A set of nationally standardized CABIN protocols are used for field collection, laboratory work, and analysis of biological monitoring data. A training program is available to certify participants in the standard protocols.

There are two types of sites in the CABIN database (reference and test). Reference sites represent habitats that are closest to “natural” before any human impact. The data from reference sites are used to create reference models that CABIN partners use to evaluate their test sites in an approach known as the Reference Condition Approach (RCA). Using the RCA models, CABIN partners match their test sites to groups of reference sites on similar habitats and compare the observed macroinvertebrate communities. The extent of the differences between the test site communities and the reference site communities allows CABIN partners to estimate the severity of the impacts at those locations. CABIN samples have been collected since 1987 and are organized in the database by study (partner project).

The data is delineated by the 11 major drainage areas (MDA) found in Canada and each one has a corresponding study, habitat and benthic invertebrate data file. Links to auxiliary water quality data are provided when available. Visits may be conducted at the same location over time with repeat site visits being identified by identical study name / site code with different dates. All data collected by the federal government is available on Open Data and more partners are adding their data continually. The csv files are updated monthly. Contact the CABIN study authority to request permission to access non open data.