Evaluating the Visualization of Fisheries Data in the Northeastern United States

Abstract

In October 2016, the Northeast Regional Planning Body (NEPRB) released the nation’s first regional ocean plan. The NEPRB identified the Northeast Ocean Data Portal as a resource that supports their goal of moving towards ecosystem-based regulatory decisions. In an effort improve the fish data on the portal this study compares fish biomass data collected between 2007-2014 from two scientific trawls. The Northeast Fisheries Science Center conducts trawls in federal waters off of the Northeastern United States, and the Northeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program uses similar trawl methodology in the adjacent state waters. Seven species were selected due to their similar distribution and abundance in each dataset. Then, the species were compared using geospatial and statistical analysis. Although results varied between species, there is no indication of high correlation between datasets. These results shine a light on potential ways to improve trawl methodologies to make the surveys more comparable. Also, understanding the differences between these datasets should urge the NEPRB to reconsider single-species data maps for more user-friendly, habitat-based, maps on the portal.