Following a routine sampling event in the Great Bras d’Or Lake in July 2017, researchers discovered a huge moon jellyfish swarm. The location of the sighting was recorded and the size of the aggregation was estimated. Nets were used to collect specimens and in addition pictures were taken with an underwater camera. Examination of specimens returned to the lab revealed that this was a spawning event based on the existence of viable planula.
Local and traditional knowledge exist of scattered moon jellies in this area for most summers however there has been no previous recording of such a phenomenon in this area.\n\nThe site was revisited six days after the original sighting. The swarm had dispersed and only a few hundred dead and dying individuals were observed. This resource contains a record of the presence of the jellyfish at this one location.
","language":"eng","citation":{"text":"Hatcher B (2021). CBU: Unusual sighting of a swarm of moon jellyfish, Aurelia aurita (Linnaeus 1758) in the Bras d'Or Lake, Cape Breton during the summer of 2017. Canadian node of the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS Canada). Occurrence dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/b3m7cp accessed via GBIF.org on 2026-10-13.","citationProvidedBySource":false},"contactsCitation":[{"key":6911151,"abbreviatedName":"Hatcher B","firstName":"B.G.","lastName":"Hatcher","roles":["ORIGINATOR","METADATA_AUTHOR"],"userId":[]}],"lockedForAutoUpdate":false,"createdBy":"09a9c196-cb5b-4fa1-afc2-3499b868b225","modifiedBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:57:58.582+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.295+00:00","contacts":[{"key":6911151,"type":"ORIGINATOR","primary":true,"userId":[],"firstName":"B.G.","lastName":"Hatcher","position":["Director"],"email":["bruce.hatcher@cbu.ca"],"phone":[],"homepage":[],"organization":"Cape Breton University – Bras d’Or Institute for Ecosystem Research (Bras D'Or Institute)","address":["1250 Grand Lake"],"city":"Sydney","province":"Nova Scotia","country":"CA","postalCode":"B1P 6L2","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","modifiedBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.272+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.272+00:00"},{"key":6911152,"type":"METADATA_AUTHOR","primary":true,"userId":[],"firstName":"B.G.","lastName":"Hatcher","position":["Director"],"email":["bruce.hatcher@cbu.ca"],"phone":[],"homepage":[],"organization":"Cape Breton University – Bras d’Or Institute for Ecosystem Research (Bras D'Or Institute)","address":["1250 Grand Lake"],"city":"Sydney","province":"Nova Scotia","country":"CA","postalCode":"B1P 6L2","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","modifiedBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.275+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.275+00:00"},{"key":6911153,"type":"PUBLISHER","primary":false,"userId":[],"lastName":"OBIS Canada","position":["data management team"],"email":["obiscanada2017@gmail.com"],"phone":[],"homepage":[],"organization":"Fisheries and Oceans Canada","address":["Bedford Institute of Oceanography"],"city":"Dartmouth","province":"Nova Scotia","country":"CA","postalCode":"B2Y 4A2","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","modifiedBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.277+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.277+00:00"},{"key":6911154,"type":"ADMINISTRATIVE_POINT_OF_CONTACT","primary":true,"userId":[],"firstName":"B.G.","lastName":"Hatcher","position":["Director"],"email":["bruce.hatcher@cbu.ca"],"phone":[],"homepage":[],"organization":"Cape Breton University – Bras d’Or Institute for Ecosystem Research (Bras D'Or Institute)","address":["1250 Grand Lake"],"city":"Sydney","province":"Nova Scotia","country":"CA","postalCode":"B1P 6L2","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","modifiedBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.278+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.278+00:00"}],"endpoints":[{"key":1242613,"type":"DWC_ARCHIVE","url":"https://ipt.iobis.org/obiscanada/archive.do?r=cbu_moonjelly_2017","createdBy":"09a9c196-cb5b-4fa1-afc2-3499b868b225","modifiedBy":"09a9c196-cb5b-4fa1-afc2-3499b868b225","created":"2026-02-12T22:57:58.812+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:57:58.812+00:00","machineTags":[]},{"key":1242612,"type":"EML","url":"https://ipt.iobis.org/obiscanada/eml.do?r=cbu_moonjelly_2017","createdBy":"09a9c196-cb5b-4fa1-afc2-3499b868b225","modifiedBy":"09a9c196-cb5b-4fa1-afc2-3499b868b225","created":"2026-02-12T22:57:58.781+00:00","modified":"2026-02-12T22:57:58.781+00:00","machineTags":[]}],"machineTags":[{"key":33142700,"namespace":"crawler.gbif.org","name":"crawl_attempt","value":"30","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-10-12T02:22:06.435+00:00"}],"tags":[],"identifiers":[{"key":463540,"type":"URL","identifier":"http://ipt.iobis.org/obiscanada/resource?r=cbu_moonjelly_2017","createdBy":"crawler.gbif.org","created":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.280+00:00","primary":false}],"comments":[],"bibliographicCitations":[],"curatorialUnits":[],"taxonomicCoverages":[{"description":"swarm of moon jellyfish","coverages":[{"scientificName":"Aurelia aurita","commonName":"moon jellyfish","rank":{"verbatim":"species","interpreted":"SPECIES"}}]}],"geographicCoverages":[{"description":"Bras d'Or Lake, Cape Breton\nCanadian Geographical Names Data Base (CGNDB) (http://www4.rncan.gc.ca/search-place-names/unique/CAEYO)","boundingBox":{"minLatitude":45.902,"maxLatitude":45.902,"minLongitude":-60.82,"maxLongitude":-60.819,"globalCoverage":false}}],"temporalCoverages":[{"@type":"range","start":"2017-07-27T00:00:00.000+00:00","end":"2017-07-27T00:00:00.000+00:00"}],"keywordCollections":[{"thesaurus":"GBIF Dataset Type Vocabulary: http://rs.gbif.org/vocabulary/gbif/dataset_type.xml","keywords":["Occurrence"]},{"thesaurus":"GBIF Dataset Subtype Vocabulary: http://rs.gbif.org/vocabulary/gbif/dataset_subtype.xml","keywords":["Observation"]}],"samplingDescription":{"studyExtent":"Original observation by chance following routine sampling at a nearby monitoring station. A second sampling event was organized one week after the first sighting.","sampling":"On the first date, specimens were collected using a net and pictures of individuals and the swarm taken with underwater camera.\nOn the second date, no samples or photos were collected. Sampling consisted of the collection of sediment samples for analysis back in the laboratory.","qualityControl":"Scientific names associated with resource occurrence records have been mapped to recognized standards - marine taxa have been mapped to the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS). The WoRMS codes, the AphiaIDs have been included as LSIDs in the occurrence record DwC field scientificNameID. \nLatitude and longitude coordinates were plotted and locations confirmed to be within the sampling area.","methodSteps":["Observation of the unusual swarm lead to consulting local experts and searching existing databases for information on similar observations.","This resource was created by Cape Breton University in collaboration with the OBIS Canada data management team. Acknowledgements: Thanks to AZMP Bras d'Or Lake monitoring team."]},"countryCoverage":[],"collections":[],"dataDescriptions":[],"dataLanguage":"eng","additionalInfo":"marine, harvested by iOBIS","pubDate":"2021-04-16T00:00:00.000+00:00","maintenanceUpdateFrequency":"UNKOWN","maintenanceDescription":"","license":"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","dwca":{"coreType":"http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/Occurrence","extensions":[],"modified":"2026-02-12T22:58:59.217+00:00"},"approximateCounts":{"occurrenceCount":1}}