Mining causes the destruction of natural ecosystems through removal of soil and vegetation and burial beneath waste disposal sites. The restoration of mined land in practice can largely be considered as ecosystem reconstruction — the reestablishment of the capability of the land to capture and retain fundamental resources. In restoration planning, it is imperative that goals, objectives, and su...

Is active restoration the best approach to achieve ecological restoration success (the return to a reference condition, that is, old-growth forest) when compared to natural regeneration in tropical forests? Our meta-analysis of 133 studies demonstrated that natural regeneration surpasses active restoration in achieving tropical forest restoration success for all three biodiversity groups (plant...

*Plant Science and Conservation, Chicago Botanic Garden, Glencoe, Illinois, USA; †Plant Biology and Conservation, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA; ‡Herbarium, Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois, USA; §Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, Plant Biological Sciences, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, Minnesota, USA; ∥Department of Biology, McGill University, Montréal, Québec, Canad...

Cultural eutrophication in estuaries and other coastal systems has increased over the last 50 yr. Some recently proposed strategies to reverse this trend have included the restoration of bivalve suspension feeders as an ecological tool for reducing phytoplankton biomass. The ecological benefits accruing from such bivalve restoration will be dependent on the characteristics of the estuary, as we...

Interest in ecological restoration has recently intensified as scientists, policymakers, and stakeholders use restoration in management strategies to address and mitigate global climate change and biodiversity loss. Northern ecosystems offer special challenges to restoration managers because of their short growing seasons and long recovery periods. This special feature of Ecology and Society on...

Ecological restoration incorporates land management principles and activities aimed at returning a damaged or degraded ecosystem back to a key historic trajectory in order to achieve goals of ecosystem health, integrity, and sustainability (Society for Ecological Restoration 2004) . Please consult Chap. 1 (Lamb et al. this volume) for additional perspectives. In the United States, many restorat...