Six decades (1959-2022) of water quality in the upper San Francisco Estuary: an integrated database of 16 discrete monitoring surveys in the Sacramento San Joaquin Delta, Suisun Bay, Suisun Marsh, and San Francisco Bay

The upper San Francisco Estuary (SFE) is simultaneously a central
hub of water delivery in California and home to commercially
important and endangered fishes, such as Chinook Salmon, Green
Sturgeon, and Delta and Longfin Smelt. Extensive ecological
monitoring has been conducted for over 50 years, mainly under the
auspices of the Interagency Ecological Program for the San Francisco
Estuary (https://iep.ca.gov/). We integrated water quality data from
16 boat-based long-term monitoring surveys in the upper SFE. This
integrated dataset includes measurements of temperature (surface and
bottom), conductivity (surface), salinity (surface), Secchi depth,
qualitative concentration of the toxic alga Microcystis (surface), Chlorophyll-a
concentration (surface), nutrients (surface), and other parameters
from 1959 - 2022. The component surveys range in sampling frequency
from thrice weekly to monthly and range in duration from 5 – 60
years. Most component surveys sample at fixed stations, but the
Enhanced Delta Smelt Monitoring survey uses random sites and some
stations (with “EZ” in the station name) of the Environmental
Monitoring Program follow the salinity field. It is highly
recommended to inspect the documentation of the component surveys
for more information on their methods.