The California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) are a unique partnership of the California Department of Fish & Wildlife, NOAA Fisheries Service and Scripps Institution of Oceanography. The organization was formed in 1949 to study the ecological aspects of the sardine population collapse off California. Today our focus has shifted to the study of the marine environment off the coast of California, the management of its living resources, and monitoring the indicators of El Nino and climate change. CalCOFI conducts quarterly cruises off southern & central California, collecting a suite of hydrographic and biological data on station and underway. Data collected at depths down to 500 meters include: temperature, salinity, oxygen, phosphate, silicate, nitrate and nitrite, chlorophyll, transmissometer, PAR, C14 primary productivity, phytoplankton biodiversity, zooplankton biomass, and zooplankton biodiversity. In 2004, the CalCOFI surveys became part of the LTER (Long Term Ecological Research) ecological studies network as a site to understand the pelagic ecosystem of the California Current. The CCE-LTER project has expanded CalCOFI goals and, with additional seawater sample analyses and vertical net tows, broaden the scope of the 67 year times-series. LTER also conducts seasonal process cruises in the CalCOFI grid and operate autonomous gliders along lines 80 and 90 (http://spray.ucsd.edu/).

https://calcofi.org/

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  • SeasaveV7 Setup & Data Acquisition. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    SeasaveV7 on Windows 7 CTD Operator's Cookbook
  • Satlantic ISUS Operation. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    Setting up and using the ISUS with Seabird CTD
  • CTD System. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    A Sea-Bird Electronics 911plus V2 CTD collects vertical profile data at every CalCOFI station. In addition to being a dual TCO (temperature, conductivity, and oxygen) system, the CTD also interfaces with a transmissometer, ...
  • CTD Standard Sensors. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    CalCOFI's primary hydrographic instrument is a Seabird 911+ CTD equipped with dual temperature, conductivity and oxygen sensors mounted on a 24-10L bottle rosette. Additional CTD sensors mounted on the rosette frame include ...
  • CTD Data Processing Protocol. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2019)
    Please note, the processing methods described use SIO-CalCOFI-developed software (DECODR & BtlVsCTD) to merge and correct Seabird 911+ CTD data with bottle samples. The Seasoft portion of our data processing protocol follow ...
  • CTD Data Algorithms. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    CalCOFI CTD data, particularly the thermodynamic properties, are computed by Seasoft based on EOS-80. Temperatures, typically from the primary temperature sensor, are merged with bottle sample data into station files which ...
  • CalCOFI CTD FAQ. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    General practices & notes on CalCOFI's Seabird 911/911+ CTD-Rosette
  • Updating CalCOFI Hydrographic Database. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2019)
    How to update the CCDB Hydrographic Database in MySQL In addition to ERDDAP, SIO-CalCOFI has a smaller, queryable, online, hydrographic database. This query form includes bottle-related data only and resides at ...
  • Scintillation Counter 2008. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2014)
    New(er) Beckman LS 6000IC (SysID# 231220) scintillation counter donated to SIO-CalCOFI by NOAA in early 2008. Repaired by SIO-CalCOFI and in service Oct 2008, replacing our broken/non-repairable Beckman LS 1801.
  • Underway Data Processing. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2016)
    Underway Data Processing Methods
  • Salinity 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2014)
    This procedure describes the method for the determination of seawater salinity using a Guildline Portasal™ Salinometer (Model 8410).
  • Reporting Decimal Line.Sta Numbers. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2018)
    Historically, when designing the original CalCOFI Line.Stations pattern, the transect lines were plotted perpendicular to the coastline with .0 decimal accuracy. Since reporting lines and stations with decimal accuracy ...
  • Primary Productivity Protocol. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2014)
    PRE-CRUISE PREPARATIONS 1. Check well in advance of cruise to be sure there is enough isotope ready to be used. This amount may vary depending on specific activity desired. Also, check scintillation fluid and all ...
  • Primary Productivity Methods. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2020)
    Primary production is estimated from 14C uptake using a simulated in situ technique in which the assimilation of dissolved inorganic carbon by phytoplankton yields a measure of the rate of photosynthetic primary production ...
  • Primary Productivity History. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    A description of the method was written February 2010 by D. Wolgast. Changes to the method are listed below.
  • NCOG Sampling Method. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2015)
    NCOG Sampling For DNA and RNA Samples for NCOG Project
  • Methods Timeline. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    CalCOFI Time Series data are over 67 years old. New adopted practices, methods, software and hardware are thoroughly tested to maintain dataset continuity as the program & science evolves. Core measurements are maintained ...
  • Line.Sta Algorithms. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2014)
    Converting between geographic coordinates in latitude and longitude and the line and station sampling pattern of the California Cooperative Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) program is a commonly required task for conducting ...
  • ISUS Nitrate history. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2017)
    The original methods description was written Feb 2010 by J. Wilkinson. Changes to the method or instrument are listed below.
  • ISUS Nitrate sensor. 

    CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation, La Jolla, CA, 2015)
    Since November 2004, a Satlantic ISUS nitrate sensor has been integrated with a Seabird 911+ CTD-Rosette system deployed on CalCOFI cruises. Cruises typically occupy 75 stations, collecting approximately 1400 discrete ...

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