Since 1992, the UC Santa Cruz rocky intertidal monitoring program has complemented the Multi-Agency Rocky Intertidal Network (MARINe) long-term monitoring through the use of the community structure and biodiversity protocols. Researchers currently sample over 200 separate sites over 30 degrees of latitude, from southern Baja California, Mexico to Graves Harbor, Alaska. These data have proven exceptionally useful to researchers, and an interactive tool was developed to enable GIS data visualization. In addition to interactive GIS data, the data set includes more than 125,000 images and metadata.
This project will support the development of a new photo database linked to the current mapping and graphics portal. The project will also support the development of an interactive tool that will allow users to search for and display images based on key words, dates, and locations. Integrating images into the interactive database will allow scientists, policy makers, and the public to easily query a searchable photo-database and link individual or sequences of photos to summary data.
Such an integrated tool will be the first of its kind and will provide a unique capability to assess to the state of the ecosystem across the entire California Current Large Marine Ecosystem.