©Danilo Lima, Agripalm Ambiental
The RRC database contains a wide variety of resources and publications related to ecological restoration, and we are actively working to expand this collection. It is our aim to serve as the principal clearinghouse for information and tools to support the work of researchers, practitioners, land managers, educators, students, and anyone else interested in restoration. Use the filter tool below to search the database by title, author, resource type, keyword, or any combination of these factors.
Although SER does review all entries in the database for relevance and quality, these resources have not been rigorously reviewed or extensively vetted in every case, and SER therefore makes no claim as to their accuracy or accordance with generally accepted principles in the field. The database is provided as a resource for visitors to the SER website, and it is ultimately left to the individual user to make their own determinations about the quality and veracity of a given publication or resource.
If there is a resource we missed, please let us know! We are interested in current books, articles, technical documents, videos, and other resources that are directly relevant to ecological restoration science, practice or policy, as well as resources treating the social, cultural and economic dimensions of restoration.
Restoration of Degraded Forest Land in Thailand: The Case of Khao Kho
Abstract:This article outlines the progress of a tropical reforestation project in Thailand, beginning with an introduction to the history of the local land degradation and an early attempt at reforestation. Initial attempts to reforest the area encountered the following difficulties: a lack of acceptance by the local population, improper planting of trees in downhill rows leading to erosion, poor selection of trees and planting in monoculture blocks without regard to microclimate conditions. To improve restoration efforts, remaining forest plots were surveyed and a list of native species was compiled. The species used for reforestation in the project were diversified to include more than 30 native species which were then planted according to seven distinct site types (based on soil moisture availability, elevations, degree of erosion, and the degree of human influence and demand).
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Restoration of Degraded Lands in the Interior Columbia River Basin: Passive vs. Active Approaches
Abstract:Evidence for success of passive and active restoration is presented for interior conifer forest, sagebrush steppe, and riparian ecosystems, with a focus on the Columbia River basin. Passive restoration, defined as removal of the stresses that cause degradation, may be most appropriate for higher elevation forests, low-order riparian ecosystems, and for sagebrush steppe communities that are only slightly impaired. More active approaches, in which management techniques such as planting, weeding, burning, and thinning are applied, have been successful in forests with excessive fuels and in some riparian systems, and may be necessary in highly degraded sagebrush steppe communities.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Restoration of Wetlands from Abandoned Rice Fields for Nutrient Removal, and Biological Community and Landscape Diversity
Abstract:A number of experimental freshwater wetlands (150 m long x 75 m wide) with different ages since they were abandoned as rice fields, were used to analyze the prospects of multipurpose wetland restoration for such degraded areas. Nitrogen and phosphorus removal rate of the wetlands were determined monthly during the flooding season to estimate their efficiency as filters to remove nutrients from agricultural sewage. The number of wetland birds was recorded regularly to identify their habitat preferences. Both the temporal dynamics and changes in the spatial pattern of land use cover during the last 20 years were determined from aerial photographs and field analysis. Apart from the improvement in water quality and the restoration of natural habitats, restoration of wetland belts around lagoons will increase spatial heterogeneity and diversity of the landscape.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Restoration of Wetlands in the Tram Chim Nature Reserve
Abstract:A major goal of the restoration was to bring back Grus antigone sharpii into the area. A habitat that could support Grus antigone sharpii and the plants necessary for its survival needed to be restored. To rebuild the wetland habitat it was essential that historic physical, chemical, and biological conditions be restored (Barzen, 1993). Once the natural biotic and abiotic processes were reestablished the area would invite other wetland animals and support a higher diversity of wetland plants. Recreating the historic hydrology of the area was the key component of the system that had to be replaced before any other habitat improvements were possible (Beilfuss and Barzen, 1994).
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Restoration Pathways for Rain Forest in Southwest Sri Lanka: A Review of Concepts and Models
Abstract:Restoration pathways are suggested that range from: (i) the simple prevention of disturbance to promote release of rain forest succession; (ii) site-specific enrichment planting protocols for canopy trees; (iii) sequential amelioration of arrested fern and grasslands by use of plantation analogs of old field pine to facilitate secondary succession of rain forest, and plantings of late- seral rain forest tree species; and (iv) establishment and release of successionally compatible mixed-species plantations. We summarize with a synthesis of the restoration techniques proposed for reforestation using native vegetation on cleared conservation areas and parks, and for the stabilization of eroded upland watersheds. We conclude with a comparative analysis with restoration work done in other tropical forest regions.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Salt marsh restoration experience in San Francisco Bay
Abstract:Efforts to restore ecologic functions in ten major tidal wetland restoration projects implemented in the San Francisco Bay over the last 25 years have had variable results. Although almost all restoration projects constructed do now support important wetland functions, in a number of cases they have performed or evolved in
ways that were unanticipated at the time they were planned. This extensive restoration experience has provided important lessons for restoration planning and design that can be applied in other estuaries.
Publication Date: 2001
Secondary Forests Associated with the Rehabilitation of Degraded Lands in Tropical Asia: A Synthesis
Abstract:Rehabilitated secondary forests constitute a potential new and emerging resource requiring changes in policy favouring the rehabilitation of the large areas of degraded land in tropical Asia. Conversion of degraded lands into rehabilitated secondary forests rather than into monoculture plantations of exotics may be better for meeting the diverse product needs of local people, other stakeholders, and changing markets, as well as for environmental amelioration. It is also a relatively inexpensive method, suitable for rehabilitation by local people. Government and other stakeholder interest in and scope for rehabilitating degraded lands to secondary forest systems tend to increase along a proposed land use intensification model.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2001
Reasons for Reforestation Success and Failure with Three Mangrove Species in Colombia
Abstract:The experiments with Avicennia germinans, Laguncularia racemosa, and Rhizophora mangle showed that the reforestation success depends mainly on site selection and preparation. Generally, all species developed best at sites with low salinities and a water level near the soil surface. Highest mortalities were found in set propagules and seedlings of L. racemosa and A. germinans, whereas the best survival rates occurred in R. mangle propagules as well as in L. racemosa saplings. Growth rates, especially of L. racemosa, were extremely high when the ecological factors were favourable, and flowering set in early.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Recovery of South African Fynbos Vegetation following Alien Woody Plant Clearing and Fire: Implications for Restoration
Abstract:The recovery of fynbos vegetation after invasion by dense stands of alien trees, and clearing by either ‘burn standing’, ‘fell and burn’, or ‘fell, remove and burn’ treatments, was investigated in two watersheds in the Western Cape Province, South Africa. Native plant density, cover, functional and biological guilds and species richness were compared with matched control sites that were not invaded, but were burnt in the same fires. Our results illustrate the dangers of this, and highlight the need for intervention before areas become densely invaded. They also highlight the need for effective biological control agents to reduce rates of spread of aggressively invasive species.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Restoration and Rehabilitation of Arid and Semiarid Mediterranean Ecosystems in North Africa and West Asia: A Review
Abstract:Mediterranean type vegetation and ecosystems have undergone intense processes of degradation for decades, centuries, or millennia under heavy and prolonged pressure from human and livestock populations. An extensive literature on exclosures, afforestation, reafforestation, rehabilitation, and other regeneration operations over several million hectares in Mediterranean bioclimatic areas from the Atlantic Ocean to the Aral Sea, combined with 50 years of personal field experience, allowed us to draw a number of conclusions on the consequences of these efforts, constraints, and limitations.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Restoration of Biogeochemical Function in Mangrove Forests
Abstract:Forest structure of mangrove restoration sites (6 and 14 years old) at two locations (Henderson Creek [HC] and Windstar [WS]) in southwest Florida differed from that of mixed-basin forests (>50 years old) with which they were once contiguous. However, the younger site (HC) was typical of natural, developing forests, whereas the older site (WS) was less well developed with low structural complexity. Structural development and biogeochemical functioning of restored mangrove forests thus depend on a number of factors, but site-specific as well as regional or local differences in hydrology and concomitant factors such as salinity and soil waterlogging will have a strong influence over the outcome of restoration projects.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Restoring Hawaii’s Dry Forests
Abstract:Here at a region called Kaupulehu, Cabin and fellow biologists and conservationists have begun an important demonstration project for reclaiming Hawaii’s degraded dry forests. The demonstration site is protected from ungulates by a fence. In just a few years of research at the site, the biologists have begun to assemble much-needed information about how degraded forests re- spond to fencing out the enemy and about what other steps may be necessary for restoring the forests.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Forest Restoration for Wildlife Conservation
Abstract:This book presents the proceedings of a Scientific and Technical Workshop on Forest Restoration for Wildlife Conservation, held in Chiang Mai, Thailand February 2000, organized by the Forest Restoration Research Unit of Chiang Mai University and sponsored by the the International Tropical Timber Organisation. The volume includes 28 peer-reviewed papers, summarizing the status of forest restoration in the region and covering a wide range of technical subjects from seed collection to silviculture, as well as social issues. A wide range of examples of innovative techniques and best practices are included, which will be of interest to both scientists and practitioners of forest restoration.
Resource Type:BookPublication Date: 2000
Handbook for Restoring Tidal Wetlands
Abstract:The Handbook for Restoring Tidal Wetlands fills an important gap in current restoration ecology literature. It provides a broad-based compilation of case studies and principles to guide the management of tidal restoration sites. Thoroughly illustrated with more than 170 figures and tables, the book covers a full range of topics including: 1) the conceptual planning for coastal wetlands restoration, 2) strategies for the manipulation of hydrology and soils, 3) the reestablishment of vegetation and assemblages of fishes and invertebrates, and 4) the process of assessing, monitoring, and sustaining restored wetlands.
Resource Type:BookPublication Date: 2000
A Conceptual Model of Ecosystem Restoration Triage based on Experiences from Three Remote Oceanic Islands
Abstract:A conceptual model, that illustrates restoration, ecological landscaping, rehabilitation and regreening, is developed. It considers biocentric, historical, aesthetic and engineering aspects. The term ecosystem restoration triage is used because the first step is to decide whether to do nothing (because, on the one hand, the system is too degraded to warrant restoration, or, on the other, because biological integrity is relatively intact and therefore either none, or minimal, restoration is required) or to do something (because restoration is worthwhile, urgent and feasible). This approach hinges on the definition that restoration in the strictist sense is a biocentric activity that returns the original compositional, structural and functional diversity, along with its dynamics and natural evolutionary potential. _ Original _ is a difficult qualifier as it depends on just how far back in time we go. Where human values are involved, this is not restoration in the pure sense of restoring ecological integrity, but is ecological landscaping, rehabilitation or regreening. Experience from three remote oceanic islands [Easter Island, Cousine Island (Seychelles), Marion Island (Sub-Antarctic)] and which represent near extremes of this model are used to illustrate it.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
A General Framework for Prioritizing Land Units for Ecological Protection and Restoration
Abstract:Our objective in this paper is to provide such a framework for cases where the goal of setting priorities is to maximize the ecological benefit gained from limited resources. We provide simple and general models that can be used to prioritize sites based on the projected ecological benefit per unit restoration or protection effort and to estimate the total projected benefit of restoring or protecting a set of sites. These models, which are based on an expression of the functional relationship between an end point and effort, hold up under a variety of situations and provide a common language for prioritization. We then discuss procedures for estimating model terms—calculations from regression curves when data are available, and use of judgement indicators when data are relatively limited. Finally, we present two case studies that apply the models and examine selected past prioritizations in the context of our framework.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
A historical perspective and future outlook on landscape scale restoration in the Northwest Wisconsin pine barrens
Abstract:The concurrent discussions of landscape scale restoration among restoration ecologists, and of historic disturbance pattern as a guideline for forest management among forest scientists, offer a unique opportunity for collaboration between these traditionally separated fields. The objective of this study was to review the environmental history, early restoration projects, and current plans to restore landscape patterns at broader scales in the 450,000 ha northwest Wisconsin Pine Barrens.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
A Synoptic Assessment for Prioritizing Wetland Restoration Efforts to Optimize Flood Attenuation
Abstract:The placement of wetland restoration projects in a landscape to optimize the functional performance of wetlands on a regional scale is often overlooked. To address this problem, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Landscape Function Project developed the synoptic approach to assign restoration priority to landscape subunits according to selected functional criteria. The approach provides a flexible, ecologically-based framework for allocating limited restoration-resources and preserving valued wetland functions on a landscape scale.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Adaptive Management of Coastal Ecosystem Restoration Projects
Abstract:The three main ingredients of an effective adaptive management plan in a restoration project are: 1. a clear goal statement; 2. a conceptual model; and 3. a decision framework. The goal ‘drives’ the design of the project and helps guide the development of performance criteria. The goal statement and performance criteria provide the means by which the system can be judged. With the conceptual model, the knowledge base from the field of ecological science plays an active and critical role in designing the project to meet the goal. A system- development matrix provides a simple decision framework to view the alternative states for the system during development, incorporate knowledge gained through the monitoring program, and formulate a decision on actions to take if the system is not meeting its goal.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Approaches to Biodiversity on Rehabilitated Minelands in South Africa
Abstract:Rehabilitation of South African minelands has shifted from an emphasis on preventing erosion to the establishment of productive grasslands, to the restoration land creation) of a diversity of landscapes or habitats. Each of these might be characterised by greater or lesser biodiversity; this has resulted in an increasing diversity of post-mining land uses. Although such post mining land use is determined in a large measure by the local resources, regulatory organisations (once very dictatorial) increasingly take the desires of the local populace (interested and affected parties) into consideration, when considering the approval of post-mining land use objectives as set out in environmental management programs.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Marsh creation in a northern Pacific estuary: Is thirteen years of monitoring vegetation dynamics enough?
Abstract:Vegetation changes were monitored over a 13-yr period (1982-1994) in the Campbell River estuary following the development of marshes on four intertidal islands. The marshes were created to mitigate the loss of a natural estuarine marsh resulting from the construction of a dry land log-sorting facility. Plant species coverage was measured along 23 permanent transects in planted and unplanted blocks on the constructed islands, and in naturally occurring low-marsh and mid-to-high marsh reference communities on nearby Nunn’s Island.
Resource Type:White PaperPublication Date: 2000
Assisted Revegetation Trials in Degraded Salt-Marshes
Abstract:At coastal sites adjacent to the Hudson Bay lowlands, intensive foraging by increasing numbers of lesser snow geese Anser caerulescens caerulescens has converted salt-marsh awards to hypersaline mudflats largely devoid of vegetation. Assisted revegetation trials were undertaken in order to determine the ability of plants to establish in degraded salt-marsh sediment Growth rate and mortality of plants both varied between sites and years, reflecting variation in the frequency of hot, dry weather from late June to early August of each year, and the salinity and water content of soils during that period. The potential for revegetation of mudflats is discussed in the context of the soil degradation processes. Fine-grain variation in soil conditions presents a major challenge for the restoration of plant assemblages in these coastal marshes.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Cattle and Weedy Shrubs as Restoration Tools of Tropical Montane Rainforest
Abstract:This article details an experiment in Colombian montane pastures dominated by two African grasses, Pennisetum clandestinum and Melinis minutiflora, to determine the effect of cattle grazing and seed addition on the establishment and growth of woody species. The results show that a low density of grazing cattle may increase the total density, number of branches, and basal area of woody species while decreasing overall woody species diversity. Where seed was added to the pasture, woody species seedling establishment significantly increased and an interaction effect was found to exist between added seed and grazing suggesting that grazing increases seedling establishment due to added seed. The authors exert that grazing cattle may aide restoration by limiting grassy vegetation and allowing for the establishment of woody shrubs which provide a favorable microclimate for the establishment of tree species.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Conceptual Assessment Framework for Forested Wetland Restoration: The Pen Branch Experience
Abstract:We propose a quantitative, ecosystem level assessment method similar to that developed by the US EPA’s Wetland Research Program (WRP approach) that includes both biotic and abiotic metrics. Similar to the IBI and HGM approaches, biotic and abiotic parameters are compared to those of reference communities, however, the proposed comparisons are quantitative. In developing the assessment method, bottomland reference systems at various stages of succession were compared to a recently restored site in South Carolina (Pen branch). Studies involving hydrology, soil organic matter and nutrient dynamics, vegetation communities, seedling establishment and competition, and avian, small mammal, herpetofauna, fish and macroinvertebrate communities were implemented. In this paper, we discuss the conceptual framework in which we developed our assessment technique.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Defining the limits of restoration: The need for realistic goals
Abstract:The search for a universal statement of goals for ecological restoration continues to generate discussion and controversy. I discuss the diverse roots of restoration ecology, and show how the complex lineages within the field have led to diverse, and divergent, sets of goals. I then review the three major themes that currently are used to develop statements of goals: restoration of species, restoration of whole ecosystems or landscapes, and the restoration of ecosystem services, and point out both the advantages and the limitations and problems associated with each category.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Ecological Principles and Guidelines for Managing the Use of Land
Abstract:Five principles of ecological science have particular implications for land use and can assure that fundamental processes of Earth’s ecosystems are sustained. These ecological principles deal with time, species, place, disturbance, and the landscape. The recognition that ecological processes occur within a temporal setting and change over time is fundamental to analyzing the effects of land use. In addition, individual species and networks of interacting species have strong and far-reaching effects on ecological processes. Furthermore, each site or region has a unique set of organisms and abiotic conditions influencing and constraining ecological processes. Disturbances are important and ubiquitous ecological events whose effects may strongly influence population, community, and ecosystem dynamics. Finally, the size, shape, and spatial relationships of habitat patches on the landscape affect the structure and function of ecosystems. The responses of the land to changes in use and management by people depend on expressions of these fundamental principles in nature. These principles dictate several guidelines for land use.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Ecological Restoration and Land Reclamation in Open-cast Mines in Shanxi Province, China
Abstract:Large areas of degraded mining land remains barren preventing agricultural, social and economically sustainable development in affected areas. As land is under short supply in China, exacerbated by the rapidly expanding population, it is now policy to restore or reclaim land degraded by mining. The aim is to develop sustainable and healthy arable-land ecosystems. This paper outlines the principles and approaches to ecological restoration, which have been adopted in Shanxi Province with reference to three typical surface mines.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Ecology of Mangrove Growth and Recovery in the Lesser Antilles: State of Knowledge and Basis for Restoration Projects
Abstract:Whereas the increasing knowledge on tropical coastal wetlands highlights the ecological and economical importance of such ecosystems, anthropogenic activities within the coastal zone have caused substantial, irreversible losses of mangrove areas in the Lesser Antilles during the last decades. Such a paradox gives strength to compensatory policy efforts toward mangrove restoration. We review the available knowledge on the ecology of mangrove growth and recovery in the Lesser Antilles as a contribution to possible restoration projects in such islands. From these results we attempt to answer the questions when, where, how to plant mangroves, and what species to use.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
Fire Management in Tasmania’s Wilderness World Heritage Area: Ecosystem Restoration using Indigenous-style Fire Regimes?
Abstract:In many natural areas, changes in fire regimes since European settlement have resulted in adverse impacts on elements of biological diversity that survived millennia of land management by Indigenous people. Some of the rainforest and alpine elements that depend on south-west Tasmania’s World Heritage Area have been in decline since European settlement of Tasmania due to an increase in the incidence of landscape-scale fires in the period 1850–1940. Some of the buttongrass moorland elements that also depend on the region are in decline or impending decline because of a decreased incidence and/or size of burns since 1940. Will an Indigenous- style fire regime serve the interests of biological diversity? We examine this question in the context of the fire ecology and fire history of south-west Tasmania. From this assessment we argue that a return to Indigenous-style burning, modified to address contemporary issues such as the prevention of unplanned ignition, suppression of wildfires and burning to favour rare and threatened species may help to reverse trends towards ecosystem degradation in this region.
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000
How to Define Targets for Ecological Restoration?
Abstract:The eight papers presented in this Special Feature result from the Second International Conference on Restoration Ecology held in Groningen, The Netherlands, 25-30 August 1998. The conference was organized under auspices of the Society for Ecological Restoration (SER), the European Ecological Federation (EEF), the Dutch Flemish Ecological Society (NECOV) and the International Ecological Engineering Society (IEES).
Resource Type:Peer-reviewed ArticlePublication Date: 2000