1. Monitoring and Adapting to Change on the Coast
Policy Implications of the Ocean Tracking Network’s Recent Adoption of the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking Project
University of Victoria, June 18-21, 2013
Robert Branton1 and John Payne2
1 Dalhousie University, Halifax Canada,
2 Blue Dot Research, Seattle USA,

2. Opening Remarks OTN is committed to:
globally uniting trackers and oceanographers
free and open access to data and metadata
careful consideration of data policy issues
promoting standards based methodologies
Node
DB Server
Web Server
Global DB Server
Global
Local
Remote
Courtesy: Donnie Lambert – Dal ITS
OTN Canada’s November 2012 newsletter (canada.oceantrack.org/news/2012-otn-canada-november-news-bulletin) announced ‘OTN has assumed ownership of the equipment and taken over operation and maintenance of three key acoustic receiver lines on the West Coast that are critical for conducting the research of the OTN Pacific Arena, as well as for addressing trans-boundary fishery issues with US researchers. Data records from the full operation period of the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking project (POST) have now been integrated into the OTN data warehouse. Data from these three lines (88 receivers) are now being managed by OTN, were uploaded to the OTN members’ portal in September-October Queen Charlotte Strait, Juan de Fuca Strait, and the Northern Strait of Georgia will make up the Northeast Pacific node of OTN once integrated with current west coast OTN lines’. Coming in its next newsletter will be an announcement that OTN has successfully deployed 34 new receivers across the mouth of Prince William Sound in Alaska (site of 1989 oil spill) in March 2013 (see Fig. 1). For a complete NE Pacific metadata report, see: members.oceantrack.org/data/discovery/NEPACIFIC.htm
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3. Operating Passive Acoustic Moorings
Tracking instruments …
Operating Passive Acoustic Moorings
Acoustic receivers
~ 800 metre spacing
~ metre depth
models / battery life
VR2W / 1 yr
VR3 / 3 yr
VR4 / 5 yr
The OTN uses both satellite and acoustic telemetry tag data. Oceanographic variables are measured by sensors on tagged animals and other oceanographic instruments and then transmitted to satellites in space, lines of receivers on the ocean floor or to robotic submarines (gliders).
-Current practice is for the receivers and associated instruments placed on the ocean floor to be periodically recovered and or downloaded via acoustic modems to research vessels and then loaded to a central database such as at Dalhousie.
-Developments are underway to also use robotic submarines to offload the receiver lines.
-Receivers are placed at 800 metre intervals at depths of 50 to 200 metres
-Life of the receivers depends on the size of the battery and can be up to 5 years.
-The Halifax Line, the world’s longest acoustic telemetry line is 156 km long and consists of 265 receivers.
Its zig zag shape avoids several active fishing grounds.
We can so far identify about 80% of the tags we detect.
Species being detected include: Atlantic bluefin tuna, Atlantic cod, Atlantic salmon, Atlantic sturgeon, spiny dogfish, and white shark.
Liquid Robotics
Wave Glider

4. Surgically Implanted Acoustic Tags
Tracking instruments …
Surgically Implanted Acoustic Tags
VEMCO acoustic tags
Optional Sensors
Temperature
Depth
Acceleration
Acoustic tags are surgically implanted into fish
Life of the tags depends on size of the battery, ranging from 3 months to 5 years.
On the left is a salmon smolt and on the right is a bluefin tuna.
In addition to an ID, simply saying ‘I am here’, tags can detect and transmit depth, temperature and acceleration, that is movement.
Tags can be programmed to transmit at various time intervals.
The must however be near a receiver for for the transmission to be detected and recorded.
And the receiver has to offloaded for the detections to be used by a scientist.
Clearly most transmissions don’t get detected.

5. Ocean Tracking Network Global Data Warehouse
53.0 million records
32,082,397 detections
31,178 known animals
52 species
15 ocean regions
164 projects
73 institutions
14 countries
OTN data managers at Dalhousie University and around the world are working to make the world's ocean tracking data and related information freely accessible without charge by the broader scientific community as well as respecting the intellectual property rights of its providers. 90% of these data are from unfunded contributors.

6. Principles, Guidelines and Policies
OECD
CFI / NSERC
Develop policies covering responsibilities of various parties involved in data-related activities
Negotiate data sharing arrangements at initial proposal stage.
Reward initial contributors with temporary exclusive use of data.
Develop a secure and easy to use Internet systems.
Be explicit about standards and promote / adopt most advanced practices.
2011 Canadian Research Data Summit
data from public funded research should be openly available in a timely manner as a condition of funding
Exceptions being sought by OTN include:
not reporting location information on endangered species as a means of protecting them from illegal harvest,
protecting the thesis data for Highly Qualified Personnel who are in training.
Intelligent open access
OTN’s original 2008 data policy (members.oceantrack.org/data/data-collection/otn-data-policy) was modeled on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) 2006 Principles and Guidelines for Access to Research Data. Much has changed since 2008, especially with regards to the evolution of national and international standards for data sharing. In 2011 the Canadian Research Data Summit resulted in a unified position of Canadian funding agencies—including OTN’s principal funding agencies Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and Social Sciences and Health Research Council (SSHRC) — to require that all data from publically funded research be made openly available in a timely manner. Meeting this standard will be a condition for all grantees to maintain funding from these agencies. However, it is also anticipated that there may be exceptions to the policy provided in some circumstances that permit investigators to restrict access to data for limited periods. Examples from the OTN context could include refraining from reporting location information on endangered species that network investigators are tracking, in order to protect the animals from illegal harvesting, and protecting thesis data for Highly Qualified Personnel (HQP) who are in training. In anticipation of this, OTN has posted a revised policy at: members.oceantrack.org/data/data-collection/policyhighlights. The POST 2010 policy document can found at:
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7. Data Submission & Access
Trackers and receiver line operators demonstrate acceptance of the data policy by
authorizing equipment manufacturers to provide instrument specifications
providing all required metadata and data
Processors provide secure facilities from which data are processed and accessed
where manufacturer specifications and tracker metadata have been provided, TagIDs can be subject to a renewable embargo based on tag life plus two years
where a proof of a scientific permit for work on endangered species is provided, TagIDs and release locations can be subject to a renewable embargo based on tag life plus ten years
TagIDs without manufactures’ proof-of-ownership and specifications are publically listed as mystery tags, thus inviting new collaborations
Tag detection are provided to tag owners whenever detected, as part of routine data processing
detections of embargoed tags are only available to owners or persons designated by owners
embargo periods may be shortened if permitted by owners
Data centres maintain various public discovery metadata and processing summaries as well as routinely push both the raw and processed data into global scale facilities

8. Sustainability / Accessibility
10/03/10
Sustainability / Accessibility
The "International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange" (IODE) programme of the "Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission" (IOC) of UNESCO main purpose is to enhance marine research, exploitation and development, by facilitating the exchange of oceanographic data and information ... As a condition of CFI funding, Dalhousie University and Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) were required to have a formally signed comprehensive collaboration agreement whereby OTN data would routinely copied to Canada's Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) designated National Ocean Data Centre (NODC), that is the Integrated Scientific Data Management Services Branch of DFO in Ottawa Canada. The required agreement is in and we that OTN and DFO are now in the process of acting on the agreement. The rational for this NODC based copy has many benefits, including: OTN data could be integrated with established oceanographic databases and potentially flowed directly into international systems such as the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS), DFO scientists on the other hand would simultaneously and effortlessly conform to both the DFO and OTN data policy and Dalhousie. Furthermore, OTN would have a built-in fail-safe decommissioning process. As part of this process OTN will use the ISO Marine Community Profile developed by the IODE and the Ocean Biogeographic Information System schemas.
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9. Data Use By accessing or using OTN Data you agree to:
give proper attribution to all Data Providers and to OTN by using the preformed citations contained in this report and in the data records, for example …
Barnes, C., Grimes, C Ocean Tracking Network Northeast Pacific Metadata and Data Series. In: Ocean Tracking Network Global Metadata and Data Atlas.
inform OTN of publications, products or commercial applications using the data,
acknowledge that neither the OTN nor the provider is liable for inaccuracies in the data,
assume responsibility for investigating and understanding the limitations of the data,
report all problems with respect to data to

10. Discussion
Acoustic telemetry based tracking involves inherent conflict
Trackers want to keep their data private until they have had time to publish
Receiver operators are required by their funders to make data public ASAP
Trackers and receiver operators need each other
trackers need detections receiver to make conclusions about behavior of tagged species they tag
line operators need the trackers to make useful discoveries in order to justify the cost of the lines to funding agencies
Both parties generally agreeing that it is desirable for all tracking data to be maintained for posterity and eventually to become fully public
Policies arrived at by OTN (and previously POST) are compromises that attempt to allow sufficient time for taggers to publish their work while satisfying the funders of receiver arrays
Acoustic telemetry presents interesting data policy issues because it involves an inherent conflict between the interests of trackers (taggers), who generally want to keep their data private until they have had time to publish, and that of receiver line (array) operators, who are generally required by their funders to make data public as soon as possible. Both parties need each other: trackers need detections from receiver arrays in order to make conclusions about the behavior of the species they tag, and the line operators need the trackers to make useful discoveries in order to justify the cost of the lines to funding agencies. Nearly all of the researchers on both sides agree that it is desirable for all tracking data to be maintained for posterity and eventually to become fully public, so the main question is how to make the data public as soon as possible. The policies arrived at by OTN (and previously POST) are compromises that attempt to allow sufficient time for taggers to publish their work while satisfying the funders of receiver arrays.
In practice, the data policies of POST and OTN have worked well, although they have not been universally accepted. A few subtle points are important to the long-term success of such policies: 1) requiring tracking metadata to be submitted immediately while enabling trackers to keep those data temporarily private makes it less likely that the data will be lost as trackers move on to other projects, priorities and jobs; 2) requesting equipment specifications directly from the manufacturer greatly improves the ability of databases to acquire and keep important equipment specification together with tag release metadata, and 3) it is important to maintain flexibility to deal with individual cases, since researchers may need to keep a list of non-standard data fields private, or to modify the length or quality of private data periods under some circumstances.
Here is a generic interpretation of OTN’s data policy documents …

11. Discussion
POST and OTN policies in practice have worked well, although they have not been universally accepted.
Subtle points important to long-term success of such policies are:
requiring tracking metadata to be submitted immediately while enabling trackers to keep those data temporarily private makes it less likely that the data will be lost as trackers move on to other projects, priorities and jobs;
requesting equipment specifications directly from the manufacturer greatly improves the ability of databases to acquire and keep important equipment specification together with tag release metadata, and
flexibility on the part of data managers to deal with individual cases, since researchers may need to keep a list of non-standard data fields private, or to modify the length or quality of private data periods under some circumstances.
Acoustic telemetry presents interesting data policy issues because it involves an inherent conflict between the interests of trackers (taggers), who generally want to keep their data private until they have had time to publish, and that of receiver line (array) operators, who are generally required by their funders to make data public as soon as possible. Both parties need each other: trackers need detections from receiver arrays in order to make conclusions about the behavior of the species they tag, and the line operators need the trackers to make useful discoveries in order to justify the cost of the lines to funding agencies. Nearly all of the researchers on both sides agree that it is desirable for all tracking data to be maintained for posterity and eventually to become fully public, so the main question is how to make the data public as soon as possible. The policies arrived at by OTN (and previously POST) are compromises that attempt to allow sufficient time for taggers to publish their work while satisfying the funders of receiver arrays.
In practice, the data policies of POST and OTN have worked well, although they have not been universally accepted. A few subtle points are important to the long-term success of such policies: 1) requiring tracking metadata to be submitted immediately while enabling trackers to keep those data temporarily private makes it less likely that the data will be lost as trackers move on to other projects, priorities and jobs; 2) requesting equipment specifications directly from the manufacturer greatly improves the ability of databases to acquire and keep important equipment specification together with tag release metadata, and 3) it is important to maintain flexibility to deal with individual cases, since researchers may need to keep a list of non-standard data fields private, or to modify the length or quality of private data periods under some circumstances.
Here is a generic interpretation of OTN’s data policy documents …

12. Conclusion
There appear to be no significant differences between POST and OTN policies other than OTN’s attention to details such as …
equipment ownership, instrument specifications, endangered species and experimental design.
manufacturer supplied tag specifications …
eliminates transcription errors where as provide proof-of-ownership and so dramatically reduce the occurrence of mystery tags - both of which have very high manual processing and communication overheads.
basing embargo period on tag life …
attract and retain interest of trackers of long-lived species.
All of which are significant issues for any animal tracking endeavour whether or not it is wholly or partly publicly funded.
We see no other major differences between the POST and OTN policies other than that OTN’s policy takes equipment ownership, instrument specifications, endangered species and experimental design into account, whereas POST did not. Inclusion of manufacturer supplied tag specifications will eliminate transcription errors where as proof-of-ownership will dramatically reduce the occurrence of mystery tags - both of which have very high manual processing and communication overheads. Basing embargo period on tag life should do much to attract and retain the interest of trackers working on long-lived species. Clearly these are all very significant issues for any animal tracking endeavour whether or not it is wholly or partly publicly funded.
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13. Recent Developments
“Improving Access to Animal Acoustic Telemetry Observations Project”
IOOS and OTN working to unite trackers and oceanographers!
-Parallel ERDDAP and GeoServer web services
-Climate forecasting (CF) based acoustic telemetry data exchange metadata convention
-Ocean Observing (IOOS) ERDDAP interface
get the data you want, in the format you want, including: csv, netCDF, kml
web accessible (WAF) ISO and FDGC .xml metadata files
-Request data directly from R and python desktop analytics
Seattle Demo Workshop June 13, 2013
Transmitter Count
by Station and Year
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14. Thank you Browsing suggestions: Acknowledgements:
members.oceantrack.org/data
oceantrackingnetwork.org
global.oceantrack.org/docs/2012-otn-annual-report
Acknowledgements:
L. Bajona, S. Dufault, B. Jones and M. Mihoff at Dalhousie for developing and operating the Ocean Tracking Network data system; A. Porter and E. Rechisky at Kintama Research for providing data and metadata from former Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking project.