Estuarine Living Marine Resources: Gulf of Mexico regional distribution and abundance (NCEI Accession 0163993)

This is the original (1992) Gulf of Mexico regional component of NOAA’s Estuarine Living Marine Resources (ELMR) Project, a national database of ecologically and economically important fishes and invertebrates in the Nation’s estuaries. The distribution and relative abundance are depicted in a consistent format for 44 species of fishes and invertebrates, in 31 estuaries in coastal Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. Species were selected according to a set of criteria, which consider their commercial, recreational, and ecological value. For each species, five life stages are considered – adults, juveniles, larvae, spawning, and eggs – with some exceptions based on individual species life history. Each estuary is subdivided into one to three salinity zones (Tidal Fresh, Mixing, and Seawater). Relative abundance was ranked on a five-tier scale by month for each life stage of each species, in each salinity zone of each estuary. Details of the methods for the original Gulf of Mexico ELMR component can be found in Nelson et al. (1992) and Nelson and Monaco (2000).