NPS I&M South Florida/Caribbean NetworkMiami, FL

Judd PattersonBrian Witcher

Continuous DataCollection In

Florida and theU.S. Virgin Islands

OverviewOverview

1) What we collect water temperature weather station

2) Access database import wizard data validation

3) Workarounds Excel graphing (VB)

4) Problems size of dataset graphing

improvements

Where We WorkWhere We Work

40 reef temperature

1 weather station4 reef

temperature

2 weather stations4 reef

temperature

10 reef temperature

Water TemperatureWater Temperature

HOBO water temperature loggers on coral reefs

located at 47 reef sites in BISC, BUIS, DRTO, and VIIS

several sites have paired sensors

data point every 2 hours

Yawzi Reef 1988-present

• one of the longest water temperature datasets in the Caribbean

Why we do this…Why we do this…

25

25.5

26

26.5

27

27.5

28

28.5

29

29.5

30

30.5

31

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 91

01

11

2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 91

01

11

2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 91

01

11

2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 91

01

11

2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 91

01

11

2

2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

Tem

pera

ture

(C

elsi

us)

Historically HOT seawater temps

Source: adapted from Miller et al. 2009

Why we do this…Why we do this…

2005 resulted in massivecoral bleaching and disease…

…and ultimately 60% decline in coral cover in the U.S. Virgin

Islands

Weather StationsWeather Stations

• land-based weather data collection in the USVI and Florida

• full weather station

• storing 9 sensor values

• logging every 10 minutes

• independent rain gauge

• storing 2 sensor values

• logging every 10 minutes

Weather StationsWeather Stations

1.Download data with a HOBO shuttle

Weather StationsWeather Stations

2.Open hobo/dtf and convert to csv

Data Validation WorkflowData Validation Workflow

3.Access database – Import

Weather StationsWeather Stations

3.Access database – Import

Weather StationsWeather Stations

4.Access database – Manual ValidationSpike

• Check suspicious readings with local airport weather

http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/TISX/2010/4/14/DailyHistory.html

Flatline

Export/GraphingExport/Graphing

Pick a station, pick a date range, select the export location...

• VB creates appropriate query

• VB creates Excel document from template and loads with query data

WorkaroundsWorkarounds

WorkaroundsWorkarounds

WorkaroundsWorkarounds

Data ForEVERData ForEVER

Remaining IssuesRemaining Issues

1) Size of dataset With each new import a performance hit is

noticeable …inevitable switch to SQL Server on the horizon

2) Graphing Excel is also at its limit when dealing with large

datasets; particularly graphing

Thanks!

Questions?