We present a comparison of Submillimetre Common User Bolometer Array-2 (SCUBA-2) 850-{mu}m and Herschel 70-500-{mu}m observations of the L1495 filament in the Taurus Molecular Cloud with the goal of characterizing the SCUBA-2 Gould Belt Survey (GBS) data set. We identify and characterize starless cores in three data sets: SCUBA-2 850-{mu}m, Herschel 250-{mu}m, and Herschel 250-{mu}m spatially filtered to mimic the SCUBA-2 data. SCUBA-2 detects only the highest-surface-brightness sources, principally detecting protostellar sources and starless cores embedded in filaments, while Herschel is sensitive to most of the cloud structure, including extended low-surface-brightness emission. Herschel detects considerably more sources than SCUBA-2 even after spatial filtering. We investigate which properties of a starless core detected by Herschel determine its detectability by SCUBA-2, and find that they are the core's temperature and column density (for given dust properties). For similar-temperature cores, such as those seen in L1495, the surface brightnesses of the cores are determined by their column densities, with the highest-column-density cores being detected by SCUBA-2. For roughly spherical geometries, column density corresponds to volume density, and so SCUBA-2 selects the densest cores from a population at a given temperature. This selection effect, which we quantify as a function of distance, makes SCUBA-2 ideal for identifying those cores in Herschel catalogues that are closest to forming stars. Our results can now be used by anyone wishing to use the SCUBA-2 GBS data set.

Cone search capability for table J/MNRAS/463/1008/table12 (Sources found by the CSAR algorithm in its non-hierarchical mode in the 850-um SCUBA-2 data (tables 1 and 2))

Cone search capability for table J/MNRAS/463/1008/tablea13 (CSAR output for Herschel (tablea1) and filtered-Herschel (tablea3) sources)

Cone search capability for table J/MNRAS/463/1008/tablea24 (Derived properties of Herschel (tablea2) and filtered-Herschel (tablea4) sources)

Cone search capability for table J/MNRAS/463/1008/tableb1 (Sources detected in increased-noise filtered Herschel 250-um data)