Ping360 scans obtained in a commercial sea cage rearing Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar)

This dataset contains a sample of the raw data (excel files) obtained from a mechanical 360-degree scanning sonar (Ping360 Scanning Image Sonars, Blue Robotics Inc., California, USA) deployed in a commercial sea-cage (140 m circumference, 27 m depth, the upper 15 m cylindrical + 12 m conical; a lice skirt was mounted to 5 m depth) rearing Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) in Norway. Fish were just transferred from the land-based facility to the sea cage, and we wanted to follow the evolution in their behavior (vertical and horizontal distribution) their first month at sea. Fish were on average 510g (post smolts) and density in the cage at the start was 4.3 kg/m3. Due to storage limits, 3 full days (24 h each) are included (one folder per date). Raw data from 38 days (not always 24h continuous) is available on request but all scans from the raw data are presented as videos (10 images per sec) in the folder "All videos from complete dataset". Description xlsx files: Timestamps are in CET and embedded in filenames (yyyymmdd_hhmmss-x). First column: angle (radians, 0–399) First row: distance (0–1199, equal to 30 m) Remaining cells: echo strength (Analog-to-Digital Converter values, 0–597) Folder "Data processing": Includes a Python script to plot sonar data, input/output examples, and a labeled scan ("Scanwithexplanations.png") in polar coordinates. The sonar is in the middle of the figure. The circular lines show the distance from the sonar and each line corresponds to a 5 m distance. Apart from the visible cage structures (cage walls, cone leading to the cage bottom and water surface), observations inside the cage are salmon. Any visible echo strength above the water surface corresponds to echo reverberation on the surface. Cage deformation due to current is also visible on the scans and examples of deformed and undeformed cage are provided in the folder "Cage deformation". Folder "Water current": Excel file with two sheets: Horizonspeed = overall sideways movement of the water in cm/sec Eastspeed = current in the eastern direction in cm/sec First column: timestamp (dd.mm.yyyy HH:MM in UTC) First range: depth (in meters) Data collected on one of the most exposed buoys of the fish farm's mooring frame.