Fin whale OBIS occurrence coverage

Synthesis

The local vault and live OBIS check agree that species/balaenoptera-physalus is a marine, pelagic baleen whale with broad oceanic coverage. The species note records 278,296 OBIS-linked occurrences, a local sample of 50 coordinates, 14 contributing datasets, and a year range of 1905-2024. The live OBIS tool returned 278,296 records with years 1901-2026, so the monitoring view should treat this taxon as well represented for occurrence coverage, while still flagging the local sample as capped scouting data rather than abundance evidence.

Threads

1. Taxonomy and habitat anchor

species/balaenoptera-physalus resolves to Animalia / Chordata / Mammalia / Cetacea / Balaenopteridae and is tagged as pelagic, migratory, vulnerable, and ship-strike exposed.

2. Occurrence coverage

The agent read the fin whale species note and queried OBIS. Both paths returned the same 278,296-record scale, with the local note carrying a compact SSD-lake sample and dataset rollup.

3. Monitoring implications

Use this record as a strong occurrence-coverage anchor for map filtering and dossier building. Do not treat the capped coordinate sample as abundance or trend by itself; pair it with dataset metadata, acoustic detections, and recent literature before drawing monitoring conclusions.

4. Researcher actions

• Open species/balaenoptera-physalus for the local occurrence summary and top datasets.
• Use organization/happywhale and organization/wdc as starting points for citizen-science and conservation context.
• Re-run the dossier with a narrower region, such as North Atlantic or Southern Ocean, when the researcher needs spatial interpretation.