Five-minute grid shapefile with marine bird density data off central California, CDAS data (1980-2001)

A shapefile of five minute grids that contains marine bird density data at-sea from the CDAS Central CA data set (1980-2001). It is a shapefile representing 5 minute x 5 minute latitude x longitude cells that house the densities (birds/sq.km.) of 40 species of marine birds during the Upwelling, Oceanic and Davidson Current Seasons. The number of marine birds seen in a cell was divided by the area sampled in the cell to estimate density. If a cell was surveyed more than once, densities were averaged and weighted according to effort. Cells that were surveyed but in which no birds were observed have densities of zero.