Science activity

Science activity #49894, updated 29 April 2022

Aquatic Habitat Sampling Platform: Standardized Fish Community Sampling Across Habitat Types

Description / purpose

Description The Aquatic Habitat Sampling Platform (AHSP) is an integrated aquatic species and habitat sampling system that can effectively monitor aquatic organisms and reveal habitat associations while having minimal or no “take” of sensitive species. Further development and deployment of the AHSP will expand data collection to shallow and off-channel habitat, while offering the capability to transition to deeper and open water habitats, providing reliable sampling efficiency estimates (e.g., probability fish detection) and “catch” per unit effort (i.e., number of individual species per volume of water sampled) and improving our knowledge about populations, habitat associations and major stressors of key organisms within the San Francisco Estuary (Estuary). Need Within the Estuary, numerous monitoring techniques are used. However, monitoring weaknesses for determining fish status and trends include: 1) restricted locations available for some techniques;2) limited ability to simultaneously assess zooplankton and fish larvae;and 3) difficulty in estimating fish population size due to lack of gear efficiency information (Honey et al. 2004). Furthermore, past attempts at integrated abundance indices from more than one sampling method have had limited success. Although there continues to be considerable collaborative monitoring and research devoted to understanding Central Valley fish species, coordination among activities has been difficult. Other issues include permitting take of listed species and time-consuming monitoring with extended periods of down time due to sample post-processing of fish and invertebrate species. Identification of key microhabitats for each lifestage and attributes and linking associated physical parameters such as habitat features (e.g., depth, structure, channel type) and water quality is needed. Objectives • Test AHSP operation within the Estuary while providing information highly relevant to pressing Delta management issues (IEP 2016); • Provide detailed information on distribution and approximate abundance of adult Delta Smelt within identified habitat types (Biological Opinion on the Long-Term Operational Criteria and Plan for coordination of the Central Valley Project and State Water Project;https://www.fws.gov/sfbaydelta/documents/SWPCVP_OPs_BO_12-15_final_OCR.pdf);and • Assess habitat associations and diurnal behavior of Delta Smelt and other fishes (Durand 2015).

Linked science activities

None specified

Collaborators

Joseph Merz, Principal investigator - Cramer Fish Sciences

Activity status

  • 1 Awarded / Initiating (2018)
  • 2 In progress / Ongoing (0 - 0)
  • 3 Complete

Funding summary

Total allocated funding: $0

Label Value
Contract # or labor code PEN#330
Implementing organization U.S. Bureau of Reclamation [USBR]
Funding organization U.S. Bureau of Reclamation [USBR]
Funding Source Not provided
Date of award 2020
Date of fiscal year-end Not provided
Total award amount $0
State type of obligation Not provided
Federal type of obligation Not provided
Reimbursability Not provided
Procurement mechanism Not provided
Annual expenditures

2020 - $340000.00

Label Value
Contract # or labor code PEN#330
Implementing organization U.S. Bureau of Reclamation [USBR]
Funding organization California Department of Water Resource [DWR]
Funding Source Not provided
Date of award 2021
Date of fiscal year-end Not provided
Total award amount $0
State type of obligation Not provided
Federal type of obligation Not provided
Reimbursability Not provided
Procurement mechanism Not provided
Annual expenditures

2021 - $390000.00

Location

Subbasins
Delta regions

Geographic tags

None specified

Products and outputs

None provided

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None specified None specified