Hydrographic data from six cruises, between April 1976 and March 1977 in the Gulf of Carpentaira are presented. Physical quantities (temperature, salinity and sigma-t) and chemical properties (dissolved oxygen, nitrate and silicate) were measured, and are presented in an associated report both as values at the stations and as contour maps. These cruises began in 1975 with the initiation of the CSIRO Tropical Prawn Research Project, a new series of Gulf-wide cruises undertaken to study the larval ecology of penaeid prawns. Approximately 70 stations were occupied on each cruise (with the exception of KL 7/76 which made only three transects in the southern Gulf). Two types of hydrographic stations were undertaken. Type 'A' stations consisted of Nansen casts with bottles every 10m from the surface to the bottom, sampling temperature, salinity, oxygen, nitrate plus nitrite, nitrogen and silicate. Type 'B' stations were Nansen casts with three bottles (at the surface, at 10m depth and within 10m of the bottom) sampling the same parameters as the Type 'A' stations. The sigma-t values were calculated from the temperature and salinity values, and the percentage of oxygen saturation was calculated from the oxygen concentration, temperature and salinity data. The difference between surface and bottom values was also calculated for all properties. The six cruises included: FRV Kalinda: KL 4/76 April 1976 KL 7/76 June 1976 KL 9/76 September 1976 FV Judy B: JB 2/76 November 1976 FV Raptis Pearl: TP 1/77 January 1977 RV Sprightly: TP 3/77 March 1977

Seagrass biomass, density and morphometrics were measured at sites around Groote Eylandt and Albatross Bay in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Environmental data such as depth were also collected at a number of sites. Transect data was collected to give a qualitative assessment of these parameters.

Data was collected on Southern Surveyor voyage SS 04/2003. The voyage took place in Northern Queensland coastal waters and the Gulf of Carpentaria during May - June 2003. The data was culminated in a Post cruise report. Access to this report is available via the links below.

Data on primary productivity in the water column was collected during a 1988 cruise aboard the FRV "Franklin" in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Twenty stations were sampled.

Megabenthos was sampled using a beam trawl, at 105 sites throughout the Gulf of Carpentaria during the Southern Surveyor cruise SS 03/90. The infauna was identified, counted and weighed. The results were used in pattern analysis of the communities. Data on sediment grain size were also collected.

A total of 94 samples were collected from St. Vincent Gulf, South Australia, from the ship Scipio (cruise 6) in 1976; for analysis of water temperature, salinity and density.

This dataset summarises 40 years of seagrass data collection (1983-2022) within Torres Strait and the Gulf of Carpentaria into two GIS shapefiles: (1) a point shapefile that includes survey data for 48,612 geolocated sites, and (2) a polygon geopackage describing seagrass at 641 individual or composite meadows. Managing seagrass resources in northern Australia requires adequate baseline information on where seagrass is (presence/absence), the mapped extent of meadows, what species are present, and date of collection. This baseline is particularly important as a reference point against which to compare seagrass loss or change through time. The scale of northern Australia and the remoteness of many seagrass meadows from human populations present a challenge for research and management agencies reporting on the state of seagrass ecological indicators. Broad-scale and repeated surveys/studies of areas are logistically and financially impractical. However seagrass data is being collected through various projects which, although designed for specific reasons, are amenable to collating a picture of the extent and state of the seagrass resource. In this project we compiled seagrass spatial data collected during surveys in Torres Strait and the Gulf of Carpentaria into a standardised form with point-specific and meadow-specific spatial and temporal information. We revisited, evaluated, simplified, standardised, and corrected individual records, including those collected several decades ago by drawing on the knowledge of one of our authors (RG Coles) who led the early seagrass data collection and mapping programs. We also incorporate new data, such as from photo records of an aerial assessment of mangroves in the Gulf of Carpentaria in 2017. This project was funded by the National Environmental Science Programme (NESP) Marine and Coastal Hub and Torres Strait Regional Authority (TSRA) in partnership with the Centre for Tropical Water and Aquatic Ecosystem Research (TropWATER), James Cook University. The project follows on from TropWATER’s previous work compiling 35 years of seagrass spatial point data and 30 years of seagrass meadow extent data for the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area (GBRWHA) and adjacent estuaries, funded through successive NESP Tropical Water Quality Hub Projects 3.1 (2015-2016) and 5.4 (2018-2020). These data sets are now publicly available through the eAtlas data portal: https://doi.org/10.25909/y1yk-9w85 . In making this data publicly available for management, the authors and data custodians request being contacted and involved in decision making processes that incorporate this data, to ensure its limitations are fully understood. Methods: The data were collected using a variety of survey methods to describe and monitor seagrass sites and meadows. For intertidal sites/meadows, these include walking, observations from helicopters in low hover, and observations from hovercraft when intertidal banks were exposed. For subtidal sites/meadows, methods included free diving, scuba diving, video transects from towed cameras attached to a sled with/without a sled net, video drops with filmed quadrats, trawl and net samples, and van Veen grab samples. These methods were selected and tailored by the data custodians to the location, habitat surveyed, and technology available. Important site and method descriptions and contextual information is contained in the original trip reports and publications for each data set provided in Table 1 of Carter et al. (2022). Geographic Information System (GIS) Mapping data for historic records (1980s) were transcribed from original logged and mapped data based on coastal topography, dead reckoning fixes and RADAR estimations. More recent data (1990’s onwards) is GPS located. All spatial data were converted to shapefiles with the same coordinate system (GDA 1994 Geoscience Australia Lambert), then compiled into a single point shapefile and a single polygon shapefile (seagrass meadows)

A stratified random grid survey of five areas in the Gulf of Carpentaria was carried out in June 1990 using demersal fish trawls with a 100mm codend on a commercial trawler. Lutjanids and other large commercial finfish were surveyed.

Current direction, temperature, and salinity data were collected using moored current meter casts in the Flower Garden Banks and Texas Shelf in the Gulf of Mexico from January 16, 1979 to May 1, 1982. Data were submitted by Texas A&M University as part of the Topographic Features project. Data were processed by NODC to the NODC standard Current Meter Data (F005) format. The F005 format is used for time series measurements of ocean currents obtained using moored current-measuring instruments, principally Aanderaa current meters (manufactured by Aanderaa Instruments Inc.). These data represent the Eulerian method of current measurement, i.e., the meters are deployed at a fixed mooring point and measure flow past the sensor. Position, water depth, and sensor depth are reported for each station. The data record comprises values of current direction and speed at specified date and time. Data values may be subject to averaging or filtering and are typically reported at 10-15 minute time intervals. Other environmental parameters may also be reported. These include: water temperature, salinity, conductivity, and transmissivity; wind direction and speed; and dominant wave direction, height, and period. A text field is available for optional comments.