Restoring the Future

Abstract

Restoration of degraded ecosystems is a major form of land management that is of increasing importance across the U.S. Federal agencies are charged with restoration as part of their multi-functional land management roles. Links between healthy ecosystems and issues of food, water and energy security, maintenance of biodiversity, and general well-being are recognized at the policy and practical level. Maintaining and restoring ecological resilience helps to buffer the impacts of extreme weather events and provides the land with adaptive potential at a time of global environmental change. Strategies for restoration depend on the severity and duration of ecosystem disturbance and the threatening factors that remain. Some form of re-stocking with native plants is commonly required. Historically, the treatment of degraded sites relied on the use of commonly available nursery stock from a limited range of plant species, often non-native plant species. Increasingly the limitations of such an approach are being recognized, and the value of an ecological approach to restoration is widely acknowledged. The production and use of native plants in the restoration of forests, grasslands, deserts, and coastal wetlands is described in this Chapter. National initiatives mandating or supporting native seed production and use for restoration are discussed.