Dataset

European Seabirds At Sea (ESAS)

EurOBIS MeasurementOrFact Open in mapper Explore occurrences

European Seabirds At Sea (ESAS) assembles offshore monitoring data on seabirds and marine mammals. This international database mostly includes data from the North Sea, yet large parts of the northeastern Atlantic Ocean are covered as well. It finds its origin in the 'Seabirds at Sea' project, which was initiated in 1979 following the discovery of major oil potential in the North Sea and an urgent need to gain more knowledge on the occurrence and distribution of seabirds in their offshore habitat. This led to the execution of large-scale ship-based surveys across the North Sea using a standardized data collection method and a first European-wide data assembly in 1991.

Citation: Vanermen N, Stienen EWM, Fijn R, Markones N, Holdsworth N, Osypchuk A, Pinto C, Desmet P (2022): European Seabirds at Sea (ESAS). ICES, Copenhagen, Denmark. https://esas.ices.dk https://dx.doi.org/10.14284/601

Published: September 17, 2025 at 09:27

URL: https://ipt.vliz.be/eurobis/resource?r=esas

Nicolas Vanermen
Vlaamse overheid; Beleidsdomein Omgeving; Instituut voor Natuur- en Bosonderzoek

Eric Stienen
Vlaamse overheid; Beleidsdomein Omgeving; Instituut voor Natuur- en Bosonderzoek

Nele Markones
Christian-Albrechts-University Kiel; Research and Technology Centre

Peter Desmet
Vlaamse overheid; Beleidsdomein Omgeving; Instituut voor Natuur- en Bosonderzoek

Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ)
Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ)

2,788,744
occurrence records
18,940,288
measurements and facts
279
taxa
209
species

Taxa

Missing and invalid fields

Field Missing Invalid
coordinateUncertaintyInMeters 2,788,744
100.0%
maximumDepthInMeters 2,788,744
100.0%
minimumDepthInMeters 2,788,744
100.0%

Quality flags

The OBIS data quality flags are documented at https://github.com/iobis/obis-qc.

Flag Dropped Records
NO_DEPTH 2,788,744
100.0%
NOT_MARINE 14,625
0.5%
ON_LAND 11,570
0.4%
MARINE_UNSURE 4,215
0.2%
NO_ACCEPTED_NAME 9
0.0%

Measurement types

DNA derived data