2016 South Manitou Island, MI Benthic Cover-Geodatabase

This dataset has been developed for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Office for Coastal Management (OCM) as a collaborative and cooperative project with the National Park Service (Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore). A workflow combining photointerpretation, object-based image analysis, field verification, and expert manual interpretation has produced benthic habitat maps including CMECS Substrate and Biotic Components for a 42km2 project area at South Manitou Island in Lake Michigan. The Substrate and Biotic Components were classified to at least the CMECS Subclass level. For both components, Co-Occurring Elements and Modifiers (i.e. Percent Cover, Induration, Surface Pattern) were added to provide further detail to CMECS units. Refer to project report for example images and corresponding CMECS classifications. This file geodatabase contains the Substrate and Biotic components as separate feature layers. Several existing data sets formed the source for the mapping effort, including underwater photography, aerial imagery, and acoustic backscatter (side-scan and multi-beam sonar). High-resolution LIDAR data was also collected around the island in 2016 which also was used to support the mapping. Field observations were collected over 2 days in August 2017 to assure the accuracy of the map products. In addition to the Substrate and Botic data, this file Geodatabase also contains field validation points collected during summer of 2017, a GPS navigation track for each field site, and digital video clips for many of the sites.

This effort is a joint project involving NOAA OCM and the National Park Service (NPS) and is a pilot project for the Coastal and Marine Ecological Classification Standard (CMECS) in the Great Lakes region. A focus of the project was on mapping substrates within the lakeshore to understand their fisheries habitat value. A nuisance filamentous algae (cladophora sp.) is also widespread in the area. This mapping effort was also intended to determine the extent of the algae.

NOAA provides no warranty, nor accepts any liability occurring from any incomplete, incorrect, or misleading data, or from any incorrect, incomplete, or misleading use of the data. It is the responsibility of the user to determine whether or not the data is suitable for the intended purpose.

Download from Digital Coast Data Registry (https://coast.noaa.gov/digitalcoast/)

None

Users should be aware of temporal changes that may have occurred since the time of the various source data sets.

None

None

Multiple feature layers were incorporated into the South Manitou Benthic Cover file geodatabase