SoS - Agency Partnerships Initiative
Working together to improve salmon data access
Photo courtesy of WSC staff
Salmon management and conservation, especially in-season fisheries management, rely heavily on timely access to many different types of information. Unfortunately, information collected by salmon management agencies varies widely in its availability. Datasets may be distributed among many different offices, stored on individual hard drives, exist only on paper, or circulated without any documentation explaining its appropriate uses. The net result is that critical information on salmon populations is difficult and expensive to pull together, making the job of decision-makers and researchers harder. And although the need for timely information delivery is crucial, there has historically been very little revenue available to do things like prepare data and database systems for full public access on the web.
One solution to the twin problem of data management capacity and data access is collaboration. In 2008, State of the Salmon (SoS) initiated the Agency Partnership Initiative to break down barriers in salmon conservation and improve each agency's ability to share valuable salmon information. The Initiative is marked by an enthusiasm for making positive incremental changes by demonstrating the value of improved information technology — from normalized database systems to web-based applications for processing and sharing data - in meeting fisheries management and conservation goals.
Each agency project is focused on its own particular business needs but with the help of a larger community of data management and research practitioners — the Salmon Data Access Working Group — each project is also striving to create systems that increase standardization across borders. As a result, all the projects aim to better position fisheries agencies to manage for healthy salmon stocks by increasing internal work efficacy, improving data and systems interoperability, enhancing public understanding, and accelerating future investments in additional data management and access systems where needed.
By helping government agencies gain access to capital for building data management and sharing tools, the State of the Salmon Program is assisting managers in their important work of monitoring and evaluating the health of salmon and providing better public access to the resulting information. With good information, we can manage for healthy salmon populations now and into the future.
Salmon Data Access Working Group (SalDAWG)
We are convening a Salmon Data Access Working Group (SalDAWG) in lockstep with the individual agency projects. The group is comprised of scientists, managers, web programmers, database developers, and others working at the intersection of primary research and natural resources management, and its resulting data and data systems. Members hail from the U.S. and Canada, from Alaska to California. The group was formed to guide the development of the agency projects and in so doing, enhance collaboration among practitioners across North America and provide a foundation for increased data interoperability across borders.
The SalDAWG has a chance to meet in person three times during 2008–2010.
Upcoming meetings:
Past meetings:
Interested in being part of SalDAWG? Want to learn more about any of the projects or find out how you can support our work? Contact Cathy at 503.467.0791.
Project Overviews
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife
We're working with the ODFW Research Lab in Corvallis to create the ODFW Salmon & Steelhead Recovery Tracker, a database and web site designed to:
• Make it easier for ODFW staff to report on their progress towards meeting salmon conservation goals.
• Provide public access to frequently requested data and information on salmon and aquatic habitat.
While the site is currently focused on coastal Coho, there is strong interest in expanding the site's geographic and taxonomic scope to reach statewide.
Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership (PNAMP)
SoS is partnered with PNAMP to create an online forum for capturing and reviewing best available methods for monitoring aquatic habitat and species. We are developing a user friendly web-based tool that reflects the unique environs driving the formulation, testing, and endorsement of field techniques. We expect this work to accelerate agency adoption of standards and improve the power of resulting observational data to tell dependable stories about the health of our environment.
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) and
National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS)
We have initiated a novel partnership between the WDFW and the NCEAS at UC Santa Barbara that's designed to significantly advance the management community's handling of salmon population data by bringing in techniques and expertise from the pioneering field of ecoinformatics.
Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Canada
We're working with DFO staff at the Pacific Biological Station in Nanaimo to develop a summarized catch and escapement data set by Conservation Unit (CU) to:
• Ensure DFO researchers have ready access to standard, core information needed to assess biological status of CUs.
• Establish the groundwork for eventual public access to escapement, catch rate, and CU status information in BC and Yukon.
Alaska Department of Fish and Game
ADFG's Copper River and Prince William Sound Commercial Fisheries office is working with us to develop databases and web applications to:
• Make it easier for ADF&G area managers to enter, edit, retrieve, and analyze escapement and biological data.
• Provide public access to frequently requested data and information.