This PIFSC Research Cruises feature service provides access to ship tracklines associated with Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center research cruises in the Mariana Archipelago. Included are cruises carried out onboard NOAA Ships Oscar Sette and Hi'ialakai during 2003-2014.

EFH boundaries for the Pacific Remote Island Areas.

The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), Division of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) staff conducted shore-based creel surveys which have 2 major sub-surveys; one to estimate participation (fishing effort), and one to provide catch-rate (CPUE), species composition data, and size of fishes. As is the case for all of these shore-based surveys, shore-based means fishing without a powered boat and can include effort such as spearfishing. DFW made early attempts at shore-based creel surveying back in the early years, but many problems existed and there were limited resources available. It is not likely that the older data was converted from the Apple to the PC environment, but this needs to be checked. A new survey design was created and implemented in about 2005 and is continuing. It has mostly focused on the west coast lagoon side of Saipan but recently has been extended to the south and part of the west coast where some shoreline areas are accessible as well. These data are considered confidential.

Circular Updates are periodic sequentially numbered instructions to debriefing staff and observers informing them of changes or additions to scientific and specimen sampling protocols.

Observer data span more than two decades and multiple database development interations. To facilitate status of stocks authors and other users of these records, a data set separate from the OLAP was created which reformats and repackages vetted (debriefed) observer data from NORPAC into a common structure, format, and syntax. The granularity of current production data is compromised, however for the purposes of longitudinal research the data set is internally consistant, and spans the developmental boundaries.

The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) Creel surveys are operated by the Division of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) and are only on the island of Saipan. Creel surveys consist of 2 major sub-surveys, one to identify the level of fishing participation for each fishing method used in the Territory, and one to determine the catch rate, species composition, and sizes of fish (and invertebrates) for each fishing method and fishing sector. Boat-based surveys are access-point surveys and include all major and some minor ports and marinas where fishing boats launch or are berthed. Although some data may exist from versions of the surveys done back in the 1980s-1990s, due to data quality issues and lack of resources, the surveys were terminated for a number of years and the earlier data may not be very useful if it exists in computerized form. It is uncertain if the earlier data was converted to newer data systems or not. Due to limited resources, it was re-initiated for day-time only sampling in 2001 and then expanded to cover the full day in about 2005. It includes specialized participation and interview surveys as with other surveys and collects all the similar effort and catch parameters as other surveys. All fishing is done from relatively small boats and occurs relatively close to the islands. This is true for all fishing in all 4 of the island areas with the exception of the longline fisheries. These data are considered confidential.

Within the depth limits of safe, no-decompression SCUBA diving (generally to 90 feet depth), NOAA-certified Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC) divers conduct towed diver surveys (TDS) as a method of assessing relatively large areas of reef habitat. This method involves towing two divers (one collecting fish data, the other collecting benthic data) behind a small surface craft that is moving at a velocity of 1-2 mph. Although the driver of the surface craft attempts to follow a depth contour, the divers also actively maneuver the "towboards" they are holding onto so as to maintain a relatively constant elevation above the surface of the reef. Towed-diver surveys are typically 50 min long and cover about 2-3 km of habitat. This map layer shows the centroid location of towed diver surveys conducted throughout the main Hawaiian Islands between the years 2005-2010.

Locations of monitoring sites related to the Pacific Islands Network (PACN) Benthic Marine and Marine Fish monitoring protocols administered by the U.S. National Park Service (NPS). These monitoring sites are located within nearshore waters of the following National Parks: * Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park (NHP) on the western shore of Hawaii Island (Big Island) * Kalaupapa National Historical Park (NHP) on the nothern shore of Molokai in Hawaii * War in the Pacific National Historical Park (NHP) on the western shore of Guam * National Park (NP) of American Samoa on the northern shore of Tutuila The benthic marine community within PACN is a complex ecologic system and a diverse taxonomic environment, including algae and corals and other invertebrates. Reef-building corals are the primary architectural organism and are sensitive to environmental degradation; therefore, they are a good indicator of overall health for nearshore marine ecosystems. Primary stressors to coral reefs include disease, bleaching, sedimentation, eutrophication, storms, and global climate change. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has proposed using coral reefs as a worldwide indicator ecosystem for global climate change (Spalding et al. 2004). For these reasons, the PACN has chosen to implement long-term monitoring of benthic marine communities. Benthic marine communities are most closely linked with marine fish, and monitoring efforts will be conducted at the same time and location to maximize data value. Fish are a major component of coral reef ecosystems. This highly diverse assemblage of carnivores, planktivores, herbivores, and detritovores serves a variety of ecological functions. Fish affect ecosystem structure, productivity, and sustainability. Selected species can act as indicators of general reef health, environmental stress, and potential ecosystem changes. Fishing is increasingly recognized as a principal threat to Pacific Ocean coral reefs and other marine ecosystems worldwide. In this respect, it is highly probable that most of the Pacific island national parks can be categorized as "impaired" to "seriously impaired" in terms of their fish communities. While the harvest of fish and other marine creatures will be addressed in a separate (fisheries-dependent) monitoring protocol, data collected through PACN marine fish monitoring contributes to the overall fish analyses by providing an in-water (fisheries-independent) assessment of the size and abundance of species within park waters.

These data provide an accurate high-resolution shoreline compiled from imagery of SAIPAN HARBOR, MP . This vector shoreline data is based on an office interpretation of imagery that may be suitable as a geographic information system (GIS) data layer. This metadata describes information for both the line and point shapefiles. The NGS attribution scheme 'Coastal Cartographic Object Attribute Source Table (C-COAST)' was developed to conform the attribution of various sources of shoreline data into one attribution catalog. C-COAST is not a recognized standard, but was influenced by the International Hydrographic Organization's S-57 Object-Attribute standard so the data would be more accurately translated into S-57. This resource is a member of https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/inport/item/39808