Restoration
View article.
This paper presents a reflexive examination of how and why we, an academic and a practitioner, arrive at different evaluations of collaborative progress in natural resource management. We situate this examination in our long-standing involvement in designing, adaptively managing, and participating in the Uncompahgre Plateau collaborative forest restoration project in western Colorado, USA.
Access article.
The global demand for restoration has increased orders of magnitude in the last decade, and hundreds of thousands of tonnes of native seed are required to feed this restoration engine. But where are all the seeds required by restoration going to come from? Wild seed resources continue to be depleted by habitat loss, land degradation and climatic change, and over-collection of seed from wild populations threatens to erode these resources further. Ethical seed sourcing for restoration now represents a core issue in responsible restoration practice. Solutions include the introduction of regulatory frameworks controlling seed sourcing from wild populations, the development of seed farming capacity and advancement of seed enhancement technologies and precision delivery systems reducing seed wastage.
Access brief.
The Pacific Northwest Region of the Forest Service’s “Eastside Restoration Strategy” aimed to improve forest health conditions by accelerating the pace and scale of restoration on national forests in eastern Oregon and Washington. As part of this effort, the Regional Office created a dedicated interdisciplinary Blue Mountains Restoration Strategy Team (ID Team) to conduct landscape-level planning across four national forests and innovate strategies to more effectively reach planning decisions. We conducted interviews with 25 key informants, observed meetings, analyzed documents, and worked with an advisory group to understand transferrable insights from the project.
Access session recordings. Use password: SAGE2019
All Lands Summit was held at the Salt Lake City Downtown Radisson Hotel on Feb 5-7, 2019.
Here, we ask how mean climate and climate variation at individual sites and across a species’ range affect the specialist-generalist spectrum of germination strategies exhibited by 10 arid land forbs. We investigated these relationships using climate data for the western United States, occurrence records from herbaria, and germination trials with field-collected seeds, and predicted that generalist strategies would be most common in species that experience a high degree of climate variation or occur over a wide range of conditions. We used two metrics to describe variation in germination strategies: (a) selectivity (did seeds require specific cues to germinate?) and (b) population-level variation (did populations differ in their responses to germination cues?) in germination displayed by each species. Species exhibited distinct germination strategies, with some species demonstrating as much among-population variation as we observed among species. Modeling efforts suggested that generalist strategies evolve in response to higher spatial variation in actual evapotranspiration at a local scale and in available water in the spring and annual precipitation at a range-wide scale. Describing the conditions that lead to variation in early life-history traits is important for understanding the evolution of diversity in natural systems, as well as the possible responses of individual species to global climate change.
View study.
The historical management of agroecological systems, such as California’s rangelands, have received criticism for a singular focus on agricultural production goals, while society has shifting expectations to the supply of multiple ecosystem services from these working landscapes. The sustainability and the multiple benefits derived from these complex social-ecological systems is increasingly threatened by weed invasion, extreme disturbance, urban development, and the impacts of a rapidly changing and increasingly variable climate. California’s grasslands, oak savannas, and oak woodlands are among the most invaded ecosystems in the world. Weed eradication efforts are rarely combined with seeding on these landscapes despite support for the inclusion of the practice in a weed management program. Depending on seed mix choice, cost and long-term uncertainty, especially for native seed, is an impediment to adoption by land managers. We investigated four seeding mixes (forage annual, native perennial, exotic perennial, and exotic-native perennial) to evaluate how these treatments resist rein-vasion and support the delivery of simultaneous multiple ecosystem services (invasion resistance, native richness, nitrogen fixing plants, pollinator food sources, plant community diversity, forage quality, and productivity). We found the increase of exotic and native perennial cover will drive resistance to an invading weedy summer flowering forb Centaurea solstitialis but provides a mixed response to resisting invasive annual grasses. The resistance to invasion is coupled with little tradeoff in forage productivity and quality and gains in plant diversity and native cover.
View article.
This study tested the effects of different levels of functional diversity (planting grasses and shrubs together, vs. planting shrubs alone), seed source (cultivars, local or distant wild-collections), and irrigation regime (spring or fall and spring) on restoration outcomes. In the higher fertility field, increasing functional diversity appeared to have a neutral to competitive effect. After declines in shrub densities after irrigation ceased, these effects did not persist. Grasses initially suppressed or had a neutral effect on weeds relative to an unseeded control, but had neutral or facilitative effects on weeds relative to shrub-only seeding. Initially, commercial grasses were either equivalent to or outperformed wild-collected grasses, but after irrigation ceased, commercial grasses were outperformed by wild-collected grasses in the higher fertility field. Local shrubs initially outperformed distant shrubs, but this effect did not persist. Fall and spring irrigation combined with local shrubs and wild-collected grasses was the most successful strategy in the higher fertility field, while in the lower fertility field, irrigation timing had fewer effects. Superior shrub emergence and higher grass persistence indicated that the use of wild and local seed sources is generally warranted, whereas the effects of functional diversity and irrigation regime were context-dependent. A bet-hedging approach that uses a variety of strategies may maximize the chances of restoration success.
View study.
This study evaluated the influence of preestablished plant species distance, direction, and identity on antelope bitterbrush (Purshia tridentata Pursh) seedling establishment and biomass production. Antelope bitterbrush seeds were planted 10- and 20-cm away from the base of three preestablished plant species. Sowing antelope bitterbrush seeds 20-cm away from preestablished plant bases yielded 1.59 times greater seedling establishment than seeds sown 10-cm away, suggesting that established plants interfere with bitterbrush recruitment. Antelope bitterbrush seedling survival after 2 y of growth was greater than 96% for all treatments, suggesting that early growth phases were the primary bottlenecks to establishment. Antelope bitterbrush forage production decreased with proximity to preestablished plants. After 2 y of growth, antelope bitterbrush biomass was almost 3 times greater for plants grown without preestablished plant neighbors or with a preestablished grass (Elymus elymoides Raf.) than with preestablished forb species (Dalea candida Michx. ex Willd. or Gaillardia aristata Pursh). Inoculating preestablished plants with soil from native sites or arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi did not influence antelope bitterbrush establishment or growth. We suggest that plant trait complementarity and spatial relationships can be used to design seeding strategies to increase antelope bitterbrush establishment and forage production.
The Revegetation Equipment Catalog provides provides descriptions, applications, photos, and vendors of equipment used for seed collection and cleaning, site preparation, revegetation, and vegetation management.
View progress report.
This document highlights work being done to address each goal of the Seed Strategy, followed by ecoregional projects that illustrate the extent of collaborations that are underway to lay the foundation for a more comprehensive network of collectors, testers, and growers to make native plants more available across the country.
Strategy actions are centered around four major goals:
- Identifying and quantifying seed needs
- Undertaking research and improving technologies for seed production and use
- Developing tools for land managers
- Ensuring good communications