Biodiversity of the snow crab trawl survey in the St. Lawrence Estuary (2019)

A research survey on snow crab (Chionoecetes opilio) was conducted from July 7 to July 26, 2019 in the Estuary St. Lawrence River between Forestville, Baie-Comeau and Matane. The main objective of this survey was to assess the abundance of snow crab and benthic species associated with snow crab habitat. Only data for benthic species associated with snow crab habitat are presented in this dataset.

Data were collected according to a fixed station sampling design consisting of 66 stations, between 31 and 279 meters depth. Specimens were collected using a beam trawl with a total width of 2.8 meters and a total height of 0.76 meters. The codend was lined with a 16 millimeter stretched mesh net in order to harvest the small individuals. The hauls were made at a target speed of 2 knots and a target duration of 15 minutes. Start and end positions were recorded to calculate the distance traveled on each tow using the geosphere library in R. The average tow distance was approximately 25 m. The area covered at each tow was the product of the trawl opening and the distance traveled.

The two files provided (DarwinCore format) are complementary and are linked by the "eventID" key. The "Activity_Information" file includes generic activity information, including date and location. The "occurrence_taxon" file includes the taxonomy of the species observed, identified to the species or lowest possible taxonomic level. To obtain the abundance and biomass assessment, contact Cedric Juillet (cedric.juillet@dfo-mpo.gc.ca).

For quality controls, all taxonomic names were checked against the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) to match recognized standards. The WoRMS match was placed in the "ScientificnameID" field of the occurrence file. Data quality checks were performed using the R obistools and worrms libraries. All sampling locations were spatially validated.