Maximum depths of the visual luminoxyscape for four species of marine invertebrate larvae from CalCOFI stations between La Jolla, California to Point Conception between 1984-2019

In this dataset, the maximum depths of the visual luminoxyscape for four species of marine invertebrate larvae were recorded. Data in this study are from CalCOFI stations restricted to an area from La Jolla, California to Point Conception and 215 kilometers maximum offshore (Station 60). We analyzed daytime casts (09:00-16:00) of both discrete bottle data and continuous CTD casts to represent the date range of 1984-2019 and used the oxygen and irradiance measurements to determine the visual luminoxyscape for each of the larval species. This range was bounded by the oxygen (partial pressure) where the pO2 would permit 50% minimum retinal function (V50; 13, 7.2, 10.2, and 6.8 kPa for larvae of 'Doryteuthis opalescens', 'Octopus bimaculatus', 'Metacarcinus gracilis', and 'Pleuroncodes planipes', respectively), and where there is sufficient irradiance for a visual response (0.0311 µmol photons m-2 s-1) for each species. Additionally, oxygen limits for metabolism were used to determine the depth of occurrence of the Pcrit (the oxygen below which the animal cannot maintain a constant metabolic rate). The depths of occurrence for metabolic limits were determined for larvae of 'D. opalescens' and 'O. bimaculatus'.