Over the past several years, the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council has led an effort, working closely with its science and management partners, to describe and characterize estuarine, coastal, and offshore fish habitat distribution, abundance, and quality in the Northeast. This project, the Northeast Regional Marine Fish Habitat Assessment (NRHA), evaluated habitat use patterns for marine fish and invertebrate communities on the northeast shelf, with a focus on more than 65 species important to fisheries management organizations within the region.
The NRHA team has developed a custom web application which will serve as the primary vehicle for sharing these assessment products. The NRHA Data Explorer allows users to visualize and explore fish habitat data, with an emphasis on habitat use by diverse fish and shellfish species in the Northeast. The Data Explorer also houses NRHA reports, metadata files, species profiles, and related publications for potential use by managers and scientists.
The NRHA Data Explorer is available for use now. Additional information and reports will be added as they become available in the upcoming months. The Council and its management partners also plan to release outreach material to highlight assessment products and help users understand how to use the explorer and interpret results. Updates will be posted to the Northeast Regional Marine Fish Habitat Assessment page.