Annual California Sea Otter Census: 2017 Range Extent Shapefile
type: Dataset
description: The GIS shapefile "Range extent of southern sea otters 2017" is a simple polyline representing the geographic distribution of the southern sea otter (Enhydra lutris nereis) in mainland California, based on data collected during the spring 2017 range-wide census. The USGS range-wide sea otter census has been undertaken twice a year since 1982, once in May and once in October, using consistent methodology involving both ground-based and aerial-based counts. The spring census is considered more accurate than the fall count, and provides the primary basis for gauging population trends by State and Federal management agencies. Sea otter distribution in California (the mainland range) is considered to comprise a band of potential habitat stretching along the coast of California, and bounded to the north and south by range limits defined as "the points farthest from the range center at which 5 or more otters are counted within a 10km contiguous stretch of coastline (as measured along the 10m bathymetric contour) during the two most recent spring censuses, or at which these same criteria were met in the previous year".
issued: 2025-11-20T03:54:05.859466
modified: 20200827
spatial: Location
contact point: Organization
  fn: M. Tim Tinker
keyword: aerial-counts
keyword: amerigeo
keyword: amerigeoss
keyword: biota
keyword: california
keyword: central-california-coastal
keyword: ckan
keyword: coast
keyword: distribution
keyword: environment
keyword: geo
keyword: geoss
keyword: national
keyword: north-america
keyword: ocean
keyword: range
keyword: sea-otter-census
keyword: sea-otters
keyword: shore-counts
keyword: southern-california-coastal
keyword: united-states
keyword: usgs-59bc4251e4b091459a591370
theme: {geospatial}

Digital Data
type: Distribution
description: Landing page for access to the data
format: XML
issued: 2022-08-07T04:03:29.061104
modified: 2025-11-20T03:54:05.847954
access URL: https://doi.org/10.5066/F7R2109J
media type: application/http

Original Metadata
type: Distribution
description: The metadata original format
format: XML
issued: 2022-08-07T04:03:29.061097
modified: 2025-11-20T03:54:05.847543
access URL: https://data.usgs.gov/datacatalog/metadata/USGS.59bc4251e4b091459a591370.xml
media type: text/xml

US Migrating
type: Agent