Here, for the first time in the Southern Ocean, this dataset contains the seasonal occurrence of the zooplankton assemblage in the Northeast Scotia Sea using a sediment trap deployed throughout 2018 (P3 observation site, 52.80 degrees S, 40.14 degrees W). Southern Ocean zooplankton provide globally significant ecosystem services through their role in carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling and food webs. The remote and extreme nature of the Southern Ocean creates significant logistical difficulties for studying zooplankton all year round and there is a significant paucity in winter data. Sediment traps are able to sample throughout the year, providing much needed insight into the seasonality of zooplankton in the Southern Ocean.

The dataset is accompanied by temperature data at depth 200 m from the CTD instrument mounted on the P3 observation site mooring.

Clara Manno was supported by UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowships project CUPIDO (MR/T020962/1). Work was carried out as part of the Ecosystems programme at the British Antarctic Survey and the Scotia Sea Open Ocean Laboratories (SCOOBIES) sustained observation programme at the British Antarctic Survey in the frame of a Western Core Box-POETS survey cruise (https://www.bas.ac.uk/project/scoobies/).