Subset of data from the TAGS database of known age seals - Elephant Seals
This database is a compendium of histories of known age seals (Southern elephant) from observations across the Southern Ocean but focussed on Macquarie Island, Marion Island, Heard Island, Mawson and the Vestfold Hills.
At Macquarie Island 1000 seals were weighed per annum between 1993-2003 at birth and individually marked with two plastic flipper tags in the inter-digital webbing of their hind flippers. These tagged seals were weighed again at weaning, when length, girth, fat depth, and flipper measurements were made. Three weeks after weaning 2000 seals were permanently and individually marked by hot-iron branding. Recaptures and re-weighings of these known aged individuals were used to calculate growth and age-specific survival of the seals.
Similar data were collected from elephant seals between 1950 and 1965 when seals were individually marked by hot-iron branding. Mark-recapture data from these cohorts were used to assess the demography of the declining population. Length and mass data were also collected for these cohorts and were used, for the first time, to assess the growth of individual seals without killing them.
At Marion Island all the elephant seals have been individually marked with two plastic flipper tags in their rear flippers. Recaptures of these seals were used to compare survival at Marion and Macquarie Islands.
At Heard Island, seals were branded between 1949-1953. Seal length was measured in feet and inches. Recaptures of seals were made up until 1955, and growth and age-specific survival was calculated. Survival data from Heard Island were compared with concurrent data from Macquarie Island.
The database was held by the Australian Antarctic Data Centre, but was taken offline due to maintenance problems. A snapshot of the database was taken in January 2015 and stored in an access database and several csv files.
This work was completed as part of ASAC project 90.
Simple
Identification info
- Alternate title
- Subset of data from the TAGS database of known age seals - Elephant Seals
- Date (Publication)
- 2017-11-02
- Edition
- 2
- Citation identifier
-
Dataset DOI
- Title
- Information and documentation - Digital object identifier system
- Date (Publication)
- 2012-04-23
- Citation identifier
- ISO 26324:2012
- Citation identifier
- doi:10.4225/15/59fa97f242641
Originator
Publisher
Principal investigator
Principal investigator
Collaborator
- Name
- CAASM Metadata
- Status
- Completed
Custodian
- Topic category
-
- Biota
- Oceans
Extent
Extent
- Description
- Temporal Coverage
Temporal extent
- TimePeriod
- 1950-01-01 2015-01-31
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- EARTH SCIENCE > BIOLOGICAL CLASSIFICATION > ANIMALS/VERTEBRATES > MAMMALS > CARNIVORES > SEALS/SEA LIONS/WALRUSES
- Keywords
-
- MACQUARIE ISLAND
- MARION ISLAND
- MAWSON
- SOUTHERN ELEPHANT SEAL
- VESTFOLD HILLS
- WEDDELL SEAL
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- VISUAL OBSERVATIONS
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- FIELD SURVEYS
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- OBIS > OCEAN BIOGEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM
- COML > CENSUS OF MARINE LIFE
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- AMD/AU
- CEOS
- AMD
- NASA/GCMD Earth Science Keywords
-
- OCEAN > ATLANTIC OCEAN > SOUTH ATLANTIC OCEAN
- OCEAN > INDIAN OCEAN
- OCEAN > SOUTHERN OCEAN
- OCEAN > PACIFIC OCEAN > SOUTH PACIFIC OCEAN
- CONTINENT > AUSTRALIA/NEW ZEALAND > AUSTRALIA > Heard Island
- OCEAN > SOUTHERN OCEAN > MACQUARIE ISLAND
- CONTINENT > ANTARCTICA
- GEOGRAPHIC REGION > POLAR
Resource constraints
- Use limitation
- This metadata record is publicly available.
Resource constraints
- Access constraints
- licence
- Other constraints
- A snapshot copy of the database taken in January 2015, and includes only data relating to elephant seals. It is publicly available for download from the provided URL. See the parent record for access to the complete database of all seal species.
Resource constraints
- File type
- Portable Network Graphic
- Title
- Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- Website
-
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode
Legal code for Creative Commons by Attribution 4.0 International license
- Use constraints
- licence
- Other constraints
- This data set conforms to the CCBY Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Please follow instructions listed in the citation reference provided at http://data.aad.gov.au/aadc/metadata/citation.cfm?entry_id=TAGS_Elephant_Seals when using these data.
- Language
- English
- Character encoding
- UTF8
Distribution Information
Distributor
Distributor
Distributor
- Fees
- Free
- Planned available datetime
- 2017-11-02T00:00:00
- Units of distribution
- MB
- Transfer size
- 22.5
- Distribution format
-
- Access, csv, text
- OnLine resource
-
GET DATA
Download the January 2015 snapshot of the Seal Tagging Database
- OnLine resource
-
PROJECT HOME PAGE
Public information for ASAC project 90
- OnLine resource
-
VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
Citation reference for this metadata record and dataset
Resource lineage
- Statement
- Observations are approximately 95% accurate. Errors in observation and entry possible where animals are misplaced.
- Hierarchy level
- Dataset
- Maintenance and update frequency
- As needed
- Maintenance note
- 2012-01-12 - record updated by Dave Connell to include a link to the database. 2016-06-16 - record updated by Dave Connell to note that the seal monitoring database is no longer online, and to include a link to a snapshot of the database. 2017-03-24 - record updated by Dave Connell after csv files were included in the download. 2017-11-02 - record updated by Dave Connell to convert it to an elephant seals subset metadata record, and publicly release the elephant seal data. 2018-06-28 - record updated by Dave Connell to add a parent DIF.
Metadata
- Metadata identifier
- string/TAGS_Elephant_Seals
- Language
- English
- Character encoding
- UTF8
Sponsor
Owner
- Title
- Parent Metadata Record
- Citation identifier
- TAGS
Type of resource
- Resource scope
- Dataset
Alternative metadata reference
- Title
- gov.nasa.gsfc.gcmd
- Citation identifier
- 289d5c5e-54e8-4605-828c-99432228be9f
Alternative metadata reference
- Title
- gov.nasa.gsfc.gcmd
- Date (Last Revision)
- 2015-11-30T03:40:16
Identifier
- Description
- metadata.extraction_date
Alternative metadata reference
- Title
- gov.nasa.gsfc.gcmd
- Citation identifier
- 8.6
- Metadata linkage
-
http://data.aad.gov.au/metadata/records/TAGS_Elephant_Seals
Point of truth for the metadata record
- Date info (Creation)
- 2000-05-08T00:00:00
- Date info (Last Update)
- 2018-06-28
Metadata standard
- Title
- ISO 19115-3
- Edition
- 2014
- Other citation details
- Version 1
- Title
- DIF to ISO 19115-1 Profile