Harbor and grey seal observations in Virginia

Michelle Guins, Deanna Rees, Zak Poulton, Alex Wilke

N/A

Objectives for this study are 1) to improve the understanding of local and
seasonal haul-out patterns, and the numbers of seals hauled out during
daylight hours; 2) to investigate any haul-out patterns in relation to
environmental factors; and 3) to investigate differences between vessel-based
surveys and time-lapse camera data collection. The data and results of these
efforts will further improve the assessment of potential impacts from the
Navy including training and testing activities, installation construction (e.g.
pile driving) and vessel-transiting activities as required under the Marine
Mammal Protection Act and National Environmental Policy Act for
Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command (USFF) and Commander, Navy
Installations Command in the region. These data may also provide important
baseline information for the assessment of potential future impacts from
climate change or other anthropogenic activities.

The sightings were made from trail cameras.

Overview

This section explains attributes included in the original dataset. OBIS-SEAMAP restricts the attributes available to the public to date/time, lat/lon and species names/counts only. Should you need other attributes described here, you are encouraged to contact the data provider.

Attributes described below represent those in the original dataset provided by the provider.
Only minimum required attributes are visible and downloadable online. Other attributes may be obtained upon provider's permission.

Attributes in dataset

Attribute (table column)	Description
oid	Unique ID number (generated by OBIS-SEAMAP)
datetime	Date and time of the sighting at local time zone
group_size	Group size
species	Species name
sp_tsn	Taxonomic Serial Number added by OBIS-SEAMAP
latitude	Latitude in decimal degrees
longitude	Longitude in decimal degrees
state	"In water" or "Hauled out"
geom	Geometry field added by OBIS-SEAMAP