Proxied dataset of inshore lobster commercial fishing for 2012 - 2021 in the Newfoundland and Labrador region. Only lobster harvested from the Newfoundland and Labrador region are included, based on species sought.Commercial data for the inshore lobster fishery does not require a set of coordinates be provided for catch records. With zero georeferenced inshore lobster records, the inshore lobster fishery leaves a major data gap in one of Newfoundland and Labradors largest fisheries. The Gulf region created a lobster proxy mapping tool, which associated each commercial lobster record with the most likely 10km2 hexagon grid cell based on a number of weighted variables. The tool was adopted by the Newfoundland and Labrador region and altered to work with its own variables which include human use, habitat, accessibility, area/location, home port distance, traditional ecological knowledge and depth. Each hexagon represents the summed total weight of all records associated with a particular hexagon.The best available commercial data used in this model is derived from landings data and may not include catches that have resulted in cash/wharf sales. As a result, there are some areas of Newfoundland and Labrador that may be under represented in this dataset where wharf sales may be high. Therefore, this dataset should be viewed as a general estimation on lobster harvesting patterns within Newfoundland and Labrador.

Study Area defined in the Agreement to Conduct a Regional Assessment of Offshore Wind Development in Newfoundland and Labrador. The study area was created by the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada in collaboration with Natural Resources Canada and the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Depicts priority area for work under the Regional Assessment of Offshore Wind Development in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Committee for the Regional Assessment of Offshore Wind Development in Newfoundland and Labrador (Committee) is responsible for providing information, knowledge and analysis regarding future offshore wind development (OSW) to inform and improve future planning, licencing and impact assessment processes. The Committee’s mandate is set out in the Agreement to Conduct the Regional Assessment of Offshore Wind Development in Newfoundland and Labrador (Agreement), and includes assessing potential environmental, health, social and economic effects of future OSW. The Agreement includes a broad Study Area. In November 2023, the Committee determined OSW interest in the foreseeable future is more likely within a portion of the Study Area set out in the Agreement. The Committee defined this portion of the Study Area as the assessment's Focus Area. The Committee continues to conduct the Regional Assessment (i.e., present information on existing conditions and consider potential impacts of OSW) within the Focus Area. The Committee's decision to define the Focus Area and supporting rationale is available here: https://iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluations/document/153431 The Agreement to conduct the Regional Assessment is available here: https://iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/documents/p84343/147037E.pdf

Greenland halibut (Reinhardtius hippoglossoides) occupy deep waters off Newfoundland and Labrador and are a commercially important species. The Groundfish Section, Fisheries and Oceans Canada – Newfoundland and Labrador Region implemented an acoustic tagging program to better understand the movement and habitat use for this species. This program began in 2021, and was further developed as a results of two DFO Competitive Science Research Fund project between 2022-2026.Fish were caught via trawl or longline, VEMCO acoustic transmitters surgically implanted, and released at site of capture. Detections occurred from acoustic receivers deployed by the Groundfish section and/or from receiver arrays associated with the Oceans Tracking Network (e.g. Northern Cod Acoustic Telemetry Array [NCAT]). Raw detection data are downloaded from receivers and sent to the Ocean Tracking Network for formatting and archiving. Data provided here summarize reported detections from 2021-2024 as part of a master’s project at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Release locations, number and location of detections, defined movement class, and detection duration are summarized by individual. Location information includes the position of the receiver the fish was detected at, and the North Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO) Divisions where fish were detected in.

Water temperature and water level are significant environmental factors affecting ecology of anadromous fish. Large-scale freshwater monitoring networks remain sparse, yet environmental protocols rely heavily on water temperature and water levels to assist decision making on river closures. Our river monitoring project in Newfoundland and Labrador provides river water temperature and river water level for salmon rivers across the province. 72 temperature loggers are deployed across 24 river systems in Newfoundland and Labrador. Temperature loggers are deployed in approximately 30 cm of water and remain in river year-round. Loggers consist of Onset level loggers, tidbit loggers, and pendants or Innovasea minilogs. Some loggers are deployed in duplicate at locations to provide data redundancy in event of equipment loss or failure. Equipment is monitored throughout the season to ensure proper placement in water columns, with downloads taking place during monitoring trips.

AIS NL Biofouling Species Fisheries and Oceans Canada's (DFO) National Marine Biofouling Monitoring Program conducts annual field surveys to monitor the introduction, establishment, spread, species richness, and relative abundance of native and some non-native species in Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) Region since 2006. Standardized monitoring protocols employed by DFO's NL, Maritimes, Gulf, and Quebec regions include biofouling collector plates deployed from May to October at georeferenced intertidal and shallow subtidal sites, including public docks, and public and private marinas and nautical clubs. Initially, (2006-2017), the collectors consisted of three 10 cm by 10 cm PVC plates deployed in a vertical array and spaced approximately 40 cm apart, with the shallowest plate suspended at least 1 m below the surface to sample subtidal and shallow intertidal species (McKenzie et al 2016a). Three replicate arrays were deployed at least 5 m apart per site. Since 2018, collector networks have been modified to improve statistical replication, including up to 10 individual collectors deployed per site at 1 m depth and at least 5 m apart (as above) from May to October. Since 2006, seven invasive biofouling organisms have been detected in Newfoundland and Labrador harbours, marinas and coastal areas.Should be cited as follows: DFO Newfoundland and Labrador Region Aquatic Invasive Species Marine Biofouling Monitoring Program. Published March 2024. Coastal and Freshwater Ecology, Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Centre, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador.Reference:TunicatesVase tunicate (Ciona intestinalis) 2012 The Vase tunicate, is a high impact solitary invader and was first detected by DFO in 2012 on the Burin Peninsula at Ship Cove and Little Bay, Placentia Bay. Various mitigation measures (McKenzie et al. 2016b) contained this invasive tunicate to a small area for six years within Placentia Bay. First detected in Fortune Bay as an established population in 2019, increasing reports of the Vase tunicate have been made along the south coast of Newfoundland. The data provided here indicates the detections of this AIS in coastal NL.From 2018-2022, the Coastal Environmental Baseline Program provided additional support to enhance sampling efforts in Placentia Bay.

This layer comprises all the available water wells in GIN (Yukon, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador) and published through the open data platforms. This layer is a combination of all individual provincial and territorial layers. The original databases are dynamically converted by an automatic process managed by Natural Resources Canada (Groundwater Information Network).

Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO), in partnership with other government organizations, indigenous groups, and community stakeholders, monitor the migratory return of Atlantic salmon to rivers each season. In Newfoundland and Labrador, there are 15 management areas, known as Salmon Fishing Areas (SFAs), with over 400 rivers containing populations of spawning salmon. Each year, salmon populations are enumerated at monitoring facilities (counting fences or fishways) on several rivers throughout the province. Monitoring begins in April or May for the downstream smolt run and in June or July for the upstream adult run and varies in timing by year and river. Not all rivers are monitored annually and years with incomplete data are often attributable to environmental factors that delay or stop monitoring during a season (e.g. fence washout due to elevated water levels). Days with zero counts can be attributable to no fish and/or closures to the monitoring facility. While monitoring facilities are used primarily to count Atlantic salmon, other freshwater fish may also be enumerated if encountered. The counts from these monitoring facilities, in addition to angling information and other monitoring activities, provide information for estimating returns for the annual stock assessment, which is an important part of conservation and management of Atlantic salmon populations in Newfoundland and Labrador. This data contains information for Atlantic salmon only.

This project was completed by the Productive Capacity group (Coastal and Freshwater Ecology Section) in the Newfoundland and Labrador Science Branch of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO). American lobster (Homarus americanus) is a commercially important decapod crustacean species along the east coast of North America, ranging from the Labrador coast south to Cape Hatteras. Juvenile lobster < 40 mm CL (carapace length) recruitment has been studied extensively in the southern portions of their range. However, investigations of settlement habitat association and recruitment of juvenile lobster in the northern extremes along the Newfoundland coast have been largely unsuccessful. We investigated juvenile lobster density, habitat, and depth associations in three areas of Newfoundland, using scuba – Port Saunders area, 8 dives conducted 28 September - 2 October 2017, and Burin Peninsula 10 dives (7 Placentia Bay, 3 Fortune Bay) conducted 30 September - 4 October 2018 over a total seabed area of 9,138 m2, within 200 meters of shore. Port Saunders and Fortune Bay had relatively higher lobster density (0.09 and 0.40 m-2, respectively); >65% were juveniles, in contrast to Placentia Bay where lobster densities of all size groups were low (mean 0.01 m-2) and no juvenile lobsters were observed at all. Where observed all juvenile lobster were significantly associated with shallow (<6 m) habitat and showed no overlap with distribution of adults (>82.5 mm CL) which we observed at depths 6 to 17 m. Our sites were dominated by varying mixes of cobble and pebble (77%); rock/bedrock (12%) and mud/sand/small pebble (11%) substrates interspersed with overlying kelp (32%) and eelgrass (11%) vegetation. We observed no significant associations with substrate or vegetation. This record contains the geographic locations of the 7 Placentia Bay sites surveyed, and information on the timing and type of data collected at each site, which was one component supported by Coastal Environmental Baseline Program of a larger collaborative project.

The dataset includes timeseries of horizontal current speed and direction, vertical current speed, water depth, and temperature at instrument depth from Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP) moorings. Data were collected as part of a multiyear effort lead by Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) to support sustainable aquaculture regulation in the Coast of Bays, an area of the south coast of Newfoundland. This dataset is the third of a series aiming to provide an oceanographic knowledge baseline of the Coast of Bays, Newfoundland. It consists of 73 ADCP timeseries varying in length from about 26 days to 235 days collected between 2009 and 2014. Analyses from this dataset were presented during a Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) meeting which took place in St John’s in March 2015 (http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/csas-sccs/schedule-horraire/2015/03_25-26b-eng.html) and from which a Science Advisory Report (http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/csas-sccs/Publications/SAR-AS/2016/2016_039-eng.html), Proceedings (http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/csas-sccs/Publications/Pro-Cr/2017/2017_043-eng.html) and several research documents were published.