The Influence of Time on the Soil Seed Bank and Vegetation across a Landscape-Scale Wetland Restoration Project

Authors:
Stroh, P.A., F.M.R. Hughes, T.H. Sparks and J.O. Mountford

Publication Date:
2012

Abstract/Summary:
Wicken Fen National Nature Reserve (NNR) in Cambridgeshire, U.K. is a wetland of international importance isolated in a landscape dominated by arable farming. The prospect of species extinctions within the NNR led to the creation of the Wicken Fen Vision, an ambitious project that will eventually expand the reserve boundary by the purchase and restoration of c.50 km2 of arable land. We sampled three fields from each of three distinct age-categories of restoration land (5, 15, and 60 years post-arable), and three fields within the adjacent, undrained NNR, to determine (1) differences in seed bank composition across age-categories, (2) relationships between restoration age, the seed bank and standing vegetation, and (3) changes in species traits across age-categories.

Resource Type:
Peer-reviewed Article

Source:
Restoration Ecology

Link:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1526-100X.2010.00740.x/abstract