🌊 OBIS Ocean Biodiversity Information System Scraper

🚀 Export marine species occurrences in seconds. Pull observations, taxonomic checklists, statistics, and dataset metadata from the Ocean Biodiversity Information System by scientific name, taxon, geometry (WKT polygon), date range, or depth. No sign-up needed.

🕒 Last updated: 2026-05-15 · 📊 Up to 50 fields per occurrence · 🐠 200,000+ marine species · 🌍 Global ocean coverage · 🗓️ Centuries of observations

The OBIS Scraper pulls from the official Ocean Biodiversity Information System catalogue, the world's largest open repository of marine species occurrence data. Each record carries up to 50 structured fields, including the scientific name with authorship, WoRMS AphiaID, full taxonomic hierarchy (kingdom through species), event date, basis of record, decimal latitude and longitude, depth, sea-surface temperature, salinity, locality, dataset provenance, and quality-control flags.

Coverage spans 200,000+ marine species observed across every ocean, coastline, and inland sea on Earth, with records contributed by 30+ regional OBIS nodes and thousands of source datasets reaching back to the 19th century. Choose between four modes (occurrence records, taxonomic checklist, statistics summary, dataset index), filter by scientific name, AphiaID, OBIS node, geometry, depth, or date, and download as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML in under three minutes.

🎯 Target Audience	💡 Primary Use Cases
Marine biologists, conservation NGOs, government fisheries agencies, environmental consultants, oceanographers, climate researchers, GIS analysts, citizen-science platforms	Species range mapping, climate-shift analysis, MPA design, fisheries stock research, biodiversity hotspot identification, environmental impact assessments

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📋 What the OBIS Scraper does

Four modes combine with up to nine filters in a single run:

• 🐠 Occurrence mode. One row per species observation with full taxonomy, geography, depth, oceanographic context, and provenance.
• 📋 Checklist mode. One row per taxon with record counts, environment flags (marine, brackish, freshwater, terrestrial), and category.
• 📊 Statistics mode. Aggregated summary counts for the matching filter.
• 📚 Dataset mode. Index of contributing OBIS datasets with title, citation, abstract, intellectual rights, record counts, spatial extent, and contributing institutes.

Filters available across modes: scientific name, taxon ID (WoRMS AphiaID), OBIS node UUID, QC flags, start/end dates, WKT geometry polygon, depth min/max. Switch on compact mode to drop low-value fields for slimmer rows.

💡 Why it matters: marine biodiversity data underpins MPA design, climate-driven range-shift modelling, and fisheries management. Building your own pipeline means dealing with paged result sets, taxonomy joins, and dataset citation tracking. This Actor handles it all on every run.

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🎬 Full Demo

🚧 Coming soon: a 3-minute walkthrough showing how to go from sign-up to a downloaded marine biodiversity dataset.

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⚙️ Input

Input	Type	Default	Behavior
maxItems	integer	10	Records to return. Free plan caps at 10, paid plan at 1,000,000.
mode	string	"occurrence"	One of occurrence, checklist, statistics, dataset.
scientificName	string	""	Scientific name filter (e.g. Carcharodon carcharias, Delphinus delphis).
taxonId	integer	null	WoRMS AphiaID. Overrides scientificName when set.
nodeId	string	""	OBIS regional node UUID(s), comma-separated.
flags	string	""	Comma-separated OBIS QC flags to require (e.g. NO_DEPTH,ON_LAND).
startDate, endDate	string	null	Event date range, format YYYY-MM-DD.
geometry	string	""	WKT polygon for spatial filtering.
depthMin, depthMax	integer	null	Sampling depth range in metres.
compact	boolean	false	Drop low-value fields (flags, dropped, absence) for slimmer rows.

Example: 200 white shark occurrences worldwide.

{
    "maxItems": 200,
    "mode": "occurrence",
    "scientificName": "Carcharodon carcharias"
}

Example: every shark/ray (Class Chondrichthyes) sighting in the western Mediterranean since 2020.

{
    "maxItems": 500,
    "mode": "occurrence",
    "geometry": "POLYGON((-5 36,-5 44,15 44,15 36,-5 36))",
    "startDate": "2020-01-01"
}

⚠️ Good to Know: OBIS records are contributed by thousands of source datasets and span centuries of observation. Coordinate precision varies (museum records can have hundreds of metres of uncertainty; modern GPS observations resolve to metres). Always check coordinateUncertaintyInMeters and the QC flags before using records for safety- or policy-critical work.

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📊 Output

Each occurrence record contains up to 50 fields including taxonomy, geography, oceanography, and provenance. Download the dataset as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML.

🧾 Schema

Field	Type	Example
🆔 id	string	"00038c8c-..."
🐠 scientificName	string	"Carcharodon carcharias"
✍️ scientificNameAuthorship	string | null	"(Linnaeus, 1758)"
🏷️ scientificNameWithAuthor	string	"Carcharodon carcharias (Linnaeus, 1758)"
🆔 aphiaID	number | null	105838
📚 taxonRank	string | null	"Species"
🌳 kingdom	string	"Animalia"
🌳 phylum	string	"Chordata"
🌳 class	string	"Elasmobranchii"
🌳 order	string	"Lamniformes"
🌳 family	string	"Lamnidae"
🌳 genus	string	"Carcharodon"
🐟 species	string	"Carcharodon carcharias"
🗣️ vernacularName	string | null	"Great white shark"
📅 eventDate	string | null	"2023-08-15"
📅 date_year	number | null	2023
🗂️ basisOfRecord	string | null	"HumanObservation"
👤 recordedBy	string | null	"J. Smith"
🏛️ institutionCode	string | null	"MBARI"
📍 decimalLatitude	number | null	36.8
📍 decimalLongitude	number | null	-122.0
📐 coordinateUncertaintyInMeters	number | null	50
🌊 depth	number | null	12.5
🌊 bathymetry	number | null	1850
🏖️ shoredistance	number | null	4500
🌡️ sst	number | null	15.3
🧂 sss	number | null	33.8
🏳️ country	string | null	"United States"
📌 locality	string | null	"Monterey Bay"
🌊 marine	boolean | null	true
📚 dataset_id	string | null	"abcd-1234-..."
🏛️ node_id	array	["abcd-..."]
🚩 flags	array	[]
🔗 url	string	"https://obis.org/occurrence/..."
🕒 scrapedAt	ISO 8601	"2026-05-15T00:00:00.000Z"

📦 Sample record

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✨ Why choose this Actor

	Capability
🌊	Global ocean coverage. Every ocean basin, coastline, and inland sea, with 200,000+ marine species recorded.
🎯	Multi-mode operation. Occurrence, checklist, statistics, and dataset modes from one input form.
📐	Spatial filtering. WKT polygon support means you can scope to a single bay, an MPA, or a full marine ecoregion.
🌳	Full taxonomy. Each record carries WoRMS AphiaID, scientific name with authorship, and the complete kingdom-to-species hierarchy.
🌡️	Oceanographic context. Sea-surface temperature, salinity, depth, bathymetry, and shore distance attached per occurrence.
⚡	Fast. Hundreds of records in seconds, multi-thousand record pulls in under a minute.
🚫	No authentication. Public OBIS open-access data. No login or registration needed.

🌍 OBIS is the official ocean component of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and is cited in thousands of peer-reviewed marine biology and conservation papers.

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📈 How it compares to alternatives

Approach	Cost	Coverage	Refresh	Filters	Setup
⭐ OBIS Scraper (this Actor)	$5 free credit, then pay-per-use	200,000+ marine species	Live per run	name, taxon, geometry, depth, date, node	⚡ 2 min
Official OBIS web mapper	Free	Global, manual	Manual	Web form export	🐢 Hours per query
Commercial biodiversity platforms	$1,000+/year	Multi-source	Daily	Many	⏳ License + onboarding
GBIF/iNaturalist exports	Free	Land + ocean mixed	Manual	Few marine-specific	🕒 Filter overhead

Pick this Actor when you need clean, structured marine occurrence data with WKT polygon filtering and zero parser overhead.

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🚀 How to use

1. 📝 Sign up. Create a free account with $5 credit (takes 2 minutes).
2. 🌐 Open the Actor. Go to the OBIS Scraper page on the Apify Store.
3. 🎯 Set input. Pick a mode, supply a scientific name or AphiaID, optionally add a WKT polygon and date range.
4. 🚀 Run it. Click Start and let the Actor collect your biodiversity data.
5. 📥 Download. Grab your results in the Dataset tab as CSV, Excel, JSON, or XML.

⏱️ Total time from sign-up to downloaded dataset: 3-5 minutes. No coding required.

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💼 Business use cases

🐟 Fisheries & Aquaculture Stock distribution and seasonal range mapping Bycatch species presence by fishing zone Historical baseline reconstruction for stock assessments Aquaculture site-suitability screening	🌍 Environmental Consulting EIA biodiversity baselines around proposed offshore projects Pre-construction surveys for cables, pipelines, wind farms Marine spatial planning evidence packs Post-impact monitoring against historical occurrences
🏛️ Government & Policy Marine Protected Area design and review Endangered species range reporting (CITES, IUCN) Climate-shift detection across decades of observations Compliance with international biodiversity conventions	🔬 Research & Conservation Climate-driven range-shift studies Species distribution modelling (SDM) training inputs Citizen-science validation against authoritative records NGO conservation campaign evidence

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🔌 Automating OBIS Scraper

Control the scraper programmatically for scheduled runs and pipeline integrations:

• 🟢 Node.js. Install the apify-client NPM package.
• 🐍 Python. Use the apify-client PyPI package.
• 📚 See the Apify documentation for full details.

The Apify Schedules feature lets you trigger this Actor on any cron interval. Monthly or quarterly refreshes keep downstream biodiversity dashboards in sync automatically.

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🌟 Beyond business use cases

Marine biodiversity data powers more than commercial workflows. The same structured records support research, education, civic projects, and personal initiatives.

🎓 Research and academia Marine biology and oceanography papers Reproducible studies with cited, versioned dataset pulls Ecology coursework and capstone projects Open-data exercises on biodiversity informatics	🎨 Personal and creative Birdwatching-style logs for marine life enthusiasts Diving trip planning around documented species ranges Educational maps and infographics for blogs Hobbyist databases for amateur naturalists
🤝 Non-profit and civic NGO marine conservation campaigns Civic transparency around offshore development impacts Investigative journalism on illegal fishing and bycatch OBIS and GBIF community contributions	🧪 Experimentation Train species distribution ML models Validate marine-tech product hypotheses with real data Prototype agent pipelines that resolve scientific names Test dashboard concepts with live ocean biodiversity feeds

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🤖 Ask an AI assistant about this scraper

Open a ready-to-send prompt about this ParseForge actor in the AI of your choice:

• 💬 ChatGPT
• 🧠 Claude
• 🔍 Perplexity
• 🅒 Copilot

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions

🧩 How does it work?

Pick a mode, supply a scientific name or AphiaID, optionally add a WKT polygon and date range, click Start, and the Actor returns clean structured rows with full taxonomy, geography, and oceanographic context.

📏 How accurate is the data?

OBIS records come from thousands of source datasets and centuries of observations. Coordinate precision varies. Modern GPS observations resolve to metres. Older museum records can have hundreds of metres of uncertainty. Always check coordinateUncertaintyInMeters and QC flags before using records for safety- or policy-critical work.

📐 How do I scope to a specific area?

Use the geometry input with a WKT polygon. For example, POLYGON((-5 36,-5 44,15 44,15 36,-5 36)) covers the western Mediterranean. WKT is supported by every GIS tool, so you can draw a polygon in QGIS or Shapely and paste the result.

🧬 What is an AphiaID?

A unique numeric identifier from the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), the authoritative marine taxonomy registry. Use AphiaID instead of scientific name when you need precise taxonomic resolution that survives synonym renames.

🌳 What is the OBIS node system?

OBIS is decentralised across 30+ regional nodes (e.g. EurOBIS for Europe, OBIS-USA for the United States) that aggregate contributions from local datasets. Filter by nodeId to scope a query to one regional node's holdings.

🔁 How often is the dataset refreshed?

OBIS updates continuously as contributors add new records. Every run of this Actor pulls live data, so your dataset reflects the current state at run time.

⏰ Can I schedule regular runs?

Yes. Use Apify Schedules to run this Actor on any cron interval (monthly, quarterly, annually) and keep downstream biodiversity dashboards in sync.

⚖️ Is this data legal to use?

OBIS publishes under permissive open-data licences (typically CC0 or CC-BY) that allow commercial and non-commercial reuse with attribution. Per-dataset licences vary, so review individual intellectualRights fields when republishing.

💳 Do I need a paid Apify plan to use this Actor?

No. The free Apify plan is enough for testing and small runs (10 records per run). A paid plan lifts the limit and gives you access to scheduling, higher concurrency, and larger datasets.

🔁 What happens if a run fails or gets interrupted?

Apify automatically retries transient errors. If a run still fails, you can inspect the log in the Runs tab, fix the input, and re-run. Partial datasets from failed runs are preserved so you never lose progress.

🆘 What if I need help?

Our support team is here to help. Contact us through the Apify platform or use the Tally form linked below.

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🔌 Integrate with any app

OBIS Scraper connects to any cloud service via Apify integrations:

• Make - Automate multi-step workflows
• Zapier - Connect with 5,000+ apps
• Slack - Get run notifications in your channels
• n8n - Self-hosted automation pipelines
• Pipedream - Event-driven workflow automation
• Airbyte - Pipe biodiversity data into your warehouse
• GitHub - Trigger runs from commits and releases
• Google Drive - Export datasets straight to Sheets

You can also use webhooks to trigger downstream actions when a run finishes. Push fresh marine biodiversity data into your product backend, or alert your team in Slack.

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🔗 Recommended Actors

• 🌳 GBIF Biodiversity Scraper - Global biodiversity occurrences (land + ocean)
• 🦅 iNaturalist Scraper - Citizen-science species observations
• 🌊 NOAA Weather Scraper - U.S. and global weather and ocean data
• 🏞️ ProtectedPlanet WDPA Scraper - World Database on Protected Areas
• 🐟 FishBase Scraper - Global fish species reference

💡 Pro Tip: browse the complete ParseForge collection for more reference-data scrapers.

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🆘 Need Help? Open our contact form to request a new scraper, propose a custom data project, or report an issue.

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⚠️ Disclaimer: this Actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by OBIS, IOC-UNESCO, or any of its contributing nodes. All trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners. Only publicly available open biodiversity data is collected.