This dataset contains the results from studies of the Weddell Seal (Lepotonychotes weddellii) in the Vestfold Hills region, Antarctica. Results from tagging surveys, photographs and aerial surveys since 1973 are reported. Numbers, life stage, sex, moult stage and migration patterns have been reported. Fecal samples have been collected and from the otoliths, vertebrae, cephalopod beaks and crustacean remains, the diets and feeding habits have been investigated. Many of the results are reported in the document. This metadata record encompasses ASAC projects 89, 95 and 199 (ASAC_89, ASAC_95, ASAC_199).

This dataset is a description of the shallow coastal marine fauna found in the Vestfold Hills and Rauer Island area, Antarctica. The results are from various surveys in this region over a 12 month period in 1981-82, and a full listing of species (with photographs) is given in the documentation. It includes benthic, pelagic and planktonic organisms of the coast as well as those that inhabit the ice-water interface.

Season whale catch records for austral summers from 1931/32 to 1979/80. Data have been aggregated into one degree cells centered on the reported position. The dataset covers five whale species - Blue, Fin, Sei, Minke and Humpback. These data have been exposed as an OBIS (Ocean Biogeographic Information System) resource via DiGIR (Distributed Generic Information Retrieval (DiGIR)).

The British Australian (and) New Zealand Antarctic Research Expedition (BANZARE) was a research expedition into Antarctica between 1929 and 1931, involving two voyages over consecutive Austral summers. This document describes the ship's log and station list taken from Biological Organisation and Station List by T. Harvey Johnston, BANZARE Reports, Series B, Vol I, Part 1, pages 1-48 Data are stored in an Access database. The 5 tables are banzare_noon_log_1929_1930 and banzare_noon_log_1930_1931 noon positions from page 46-47 - assumed log_date is local noon, latitude and longitude in decimals. banzare_stations_1929_1930 and banzare_stations_1930_1931 odate is station date (no time is given) depth is echo depth (metres) latg and long is refined positions using Google Earth and Kerguelen map on page 14 full_speed_nets_1930_1931 log of full sped nets - see pages 40-44; time is possibly UTC distance is travel of ship when net is deployed depth is possible depth of net in fathoms tow_speed is ship speed in knots

At Heard Island, Southern Indian Ocean, 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.

This dataset comprises data on the distribution and abundance of seabirds in the Southern Indian Ocean. A database of seal, whale and bird observations made from ships since the 1978/1979 austral summer shipping season. Observations are typically made from the bridge out one side of the ship. Data held in this database greater than two years old are publicly available. This work forms part of ASAC project 1219 (ASAC_1219). Initial datasets were from the BIOMASS cruises (ADBEX1,ADBEX2,ADBEX3, SIBEX, FIBEX). This work was completed as part of ASAC project 2208 (ASAC 2208). This project also incorporates several other ASAC projects. These are: ASAC_533 - The Distribution and Abundance of Seabirds at Sea in Prydz Bay in Relation to Physical and Biological Parameters ASAC_657 - Prey Consumption by Seabirds around Heard Island in Relation to Physical and Biological Oceanographic Parameters ASAC_725 - The role of the marginal ice zone in the consumption of marine resources by Antarctic seabirds in the Southern Indian Ocean ASAC_1219 - Monitoring for long-term or cumulative impacts in Southern Ocean seabirds Data from these projects were fed directly into project 2208. The fields in the csv file are: wov_data_id (the internal identifier of the record) observation_date (the date of observation, in ISO8601 format yyyy-mm-ddTHH:MM:SSZ. This information is also separated into the year, month, day, etc components) observation_date_year (the year of the observation date) observation_date_month (the month of the observation date) observation_date_day (the day of the observation date) observation_date_hour (the hour of the observation date) observation_date_minute (the minute of the observation date) observation_date_second (the second of the observation date) observation_date_time_zone (the time zone of the observation date) latitude (the latitude of the observation, in decimal degrees) longitude (the longitude of the observation, in decimal degrees) ship_speed (knots) ship_course (degrees) seastate (scale of wave conditions, from "calm-glassy" to "phenomenal (over 14 m)") sea_temperature (sea surface temperature from the ship's instrumentation, in degrees C) seaice (tenths of sea ice cover) visibility (the limit of effective visibility, from "less than 300 m" to "Unrestricted visibility") salinity (sea surface salinity from the ship's instrumentation, in practical salinity units PSU) depth (water depth in metres) cloud_cover (oktas) precipitation (description of precipitation conditions, from "No precipitation/ clear" to "Thunderstorms") windforce (scale of wind conditions with speed range in knots, from "Calm (0-0.9)" to "Hurricane (109-112)") wind_direction (the direction the wind is blowing from, in degrees [north=0, east=90]) air_temperature (degrees C) air_pressure (hectopascals) ship_activity (short description of the ship activity at the time of the observation) species_type (Bird, Seal, Whale) taxon_id (internal identification code for the species observed) bird_age (juvenile, subadult, or adult) distance (distance of observed animal from the ship: "Near (0-300m)", "Middle 300-1000 m", or "Far + 1000 m" ) species_count (the number of individuals observed in total) feeding_count (the number of individuals observed that were feeding) sitting_on_water_count (the number of individuals observed that were sitting on water) sitting_on_ice_count (the number of individuals observed that were sitting on ice) sitting_on_ship_count (the number of individuals observed that were sitting on the ship) in_hand_count (the number of individuals observed that were held in the hand) flying_past_count (the number of individuals observed that were flying past) accompanying_count (the number of individuals observed that were accompanying the vessel) following_wake_count (the number of individuals observed that were following the wake of the vessel) bird_direction (direction of travel of observed individuals, in degrees [northwards travel=0, eastwards travel=90]) observation_code (the type of observation activity being conducted, e.g. "Stern count", "Forward Quadrant", or "null observation - no birds seen") swimming_past_count (the number of individuals observed that were swimming past the vessel) float_in_water_count (the number of individuals observed that were floating in the water) porpoising_count (the number of individuals observed that were porpoising) following_count (the number of individuals observed that were following the vessel) surfacing_count (the number of individuals observed that were surfacing) breaching_count (the number of individuals observed that were breaching) blowing_count (the number of individuals observed that were blowing) move_thru_ice_count (the number of individuals observed that were moving through ice) frolicking_count (the number of individuals observed that were frolicking) voyage_id (the internal identifier of the voyage) notes (other notes recorded during the observation) date_created (the date the observation record was created, in ISO8601 format yyyy-mm-ddTHH:MM:SSZ) date_revised (the date the observation record was last revised, in ISO8601 format yyyy-mm-ddTHH:MM:SSZ) husky_code (the species code used in the husky data logging system) identification_status (status of the species identification: "Confirmed" or "Unconfirmed") wind_speed (wind speed, in knots) data_notes (notes about the data associated with the observation) genus (genus name of the observed species) species (specific epithet of the observed species) common_name (common name of the observed species) subspecies (subspecies name of the observed species) aphia_id (the taxonomic identifier of the observed species, from the Register of Antarctic Marine Species and the World Register of Marine Species, http://www.marinespecies.org/)

Ship-based observations of whales sightings from the original 'ANARE Whale Log' books have been recovered into a single repository of sightings. ANARE (Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions) is the historic acronym for these voyages. Currently there are data from 4 voyages, from the 1990's. Further data will be entered from existing Whale log datasheets on an ongoing basis. Observing platforms currently only include the ship, Aurora Australis. The quality and quantity of abiotic data associated with observations such as air temperature, sea ice cover etc vary immensely from voyage to voyage. Where possible these data have been entered. This dataset contains no information on estimates of survey effort and cannot be used to derive useful presence/absence spatial coverages of species during this period. It is purely sighting data only. Species distribution data are made available to SCAR-MarBIN (http://www.scarmarbin.be), OBIS and GBIF via the DiGIR protocol and Darwin Core schema.

Metadata record for data from ASAC Project 915 and 2253 See the link below for public details on these projects. Our cetacean research is conducted on multidisciplinary cruises aimed at investigating environmental change and ecosystem effects. Our research approach now integrates broad scale acoustic monitoring with fine scale ecology experiments during annual surveys with AMLR. These data will allow us to connect fine scale variability with regional and circum-Antarctic processes, and eventually to understand how the dynamics of the Antarctic ecosystem and environmental change might affect the recovery of whale populations. The BROKE WEST multidisciplinary survey to be held in the 2005/2006 season will provide a large-scale simultaneously collected dataset within which to analyse the cetacean distribution, ecological and acoustic data. These sightings were made on Australian Antarctic Division voyages. For further information about these voyages, see the URL given below. Codes provided in the download file for voyage come in two formats: V70102 - Voyage 7 of the 2001/2002 season KK0102 - Use of the Kapitan Khlebnikov by the Australian Antarctic Division in the 2001/2002 season. The download file will include an excel spreadsheet of sightings, resightings and incidental sightings, as well as an explanatory word document. For further details on methods used, and an explanation of the types of data collected, see the above mentioned word document. These data were collected as part of ASAC projects 915 and 2253 (ASAC_915 and ASAC_2253). The fields in this dataset are: Voyage Data Logger (Logger/Wincruz) Date Time Observer Method Bearing Distance (nautical miles) Swim Direction Near Ice Species Reaction Group Size Latitude Longitude

Metadata record for data expected from ASAC Project 2163 See the link below for public details on this project. Records of observations of kelp rafts passing within 50 m of one side of the vessel over replicated periods of 1 hour. Data collected over subantarctic latitudes only. Records include: size, species, presence/absence of holdfast, latitude and longitude, ship speed.

A repository of all ARGOS satellite messages from 1982 to present. Trackers have been used on AWS stations, buoys and numerous species of whales, seals and seabirds. ARGOS is a means of sending data back from PTT devices - Position Tracking Terminals. However, the subject does not necessarily have to be moving - as in the case of the Automatic Weather Stations (AWS), which use ARGOS for relaying meteorological data back to Australia. Animal species that have been or are currently monitored by the Australian Antarctic Program using the ARGOS system include: Grey-headed Albatross Black-browed Albatross Light mantled sooty albatross Australian Fur Seal Antarctic Fur Seal Weddell Seal Ross seal Crabeater seal Southern Elephant Seal Emperor Penguin King Penguin Macaroni Penguin Adelie Penguin Pygmy Blue Whale Locations in which the ARGOS system is/was being used by the Australian Antarctic Program are: Admiralty Bay Albatross Island Almagro Auster Rookery Bechervaise Island Cape Gantheaume Caroline Cove Casey Davis Diego Ramirez Dumont d'Urville, Base Edmonson Point Ildefonso Inexpressible Island Macquarie Island Magnetic Island Pedra Branca Scullin Monolith Shirley Island Spit Bay Taylor Rookery Ufs Island Each day, data is retrieved via telnet client from the ARGOS site in France. A batch process parses the data files and inserts into the Data Centre database by 0800 local time. End-users can subscribe to an email describing the recent data uploads. Web-based tools are provided to filter the data by bounding box, time span and type of message quality. Finally a optional velocity filter can be applied to remove spurious positions that should not be reachable by that particular species. For example, seal data can be filtered for positions that would require speeds in excess of 10 km/hr. The same tool ascribes species, gender, age class and breeding status to each set of data. A separate control allows the filtered data to be published to the general public and/or to OBIS and GBIF via web services. Output products include maps, excel spreadsheets and KML files for mapping data on Google Earth.