Dataset: lobster water temperature
Deployment: NEC-DC2002-1

Each lobster was tagged with three pieces of equipment: a sonar transmitter that emits a unique frequency/code combination, a temperature datalogger ("Tidbit") that records the ambient water temperature every hour, and a ribbon tag with the lobster's ID and The Lobster Conservancy (TLC) phone number to identify the lobster in the event of recapture. Participants were equipped with vessel-based hydrophones to periodically "listen" for sonar signals throughout their fishing territory. Frequency and code were recorded from each observed signal and the lobster ID was subsequently looked up. Hence, the tagged lobsters could be tracked any one of three ways: via hydrophone, trap recapture, or SCUBA dive recapture (using an underwater dive receiver). Information on lobster egg state could only be collected upon recapture. Likewise, temperature data collected by the Tidbit was only useful if the logger was recovered upon recapture and the information downloaded. Temperature data on 30 lobsters from the 2002-2003 season and 18 lobsters from the 2003-2004 season were downloaded as well as data from stationery loggers. Each lobster ID in that data object corresponds to lobster IDs in the associated data objects.

Many fishing vessels were used for this dataset, including:  F/V Maureen R, F/V Finest Kind, F/V Amanda Kate, F/V Sarah Ashley, F/V Steacker, F/V Redeemed, F/V A-Bill, F/V Haley & Amy, F/V Pamela B.    Most of these are based in Friendship, Maine, with the exception of F/V Maureen R, which is based in Waldoboro.

See Deployment Report for details.