active restoration

Restoration is considered an effective strategy to accelerate the recovery of biological communities at local scale. However, the effects of restoration actions in the marine ecosystems are still unpredictable. We performed a global analysis of published literature to identify the factors increasing the probability of restoration success in coastal and marine systems. Our results confirm that the majority of active restoration initiatives are still concentrated in the northern hemisphere and that most of information gathered from restoration efforts derives from a relatively small subset of species. The analysis also indicates that many studies are still experimental in nature, covering small spatial and temporal scales. Despite the limits of assessing restoration effectiveness in absence of a standardized definition of success, the context (degree of human impact, ecosystem type, habitat) of where the restoration activity is undertaken is of greater relevance to a successful outcom...

Farmland afforestation has been promoted in recent decades and is one of the main strategies included in the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration to recover degraded areas. However, the impacts of afforestation on plant diversity and soil quality indicators are still not well-understood in semiarid environments. In this study, we assessed the relationships between plant diversity indicators (abundance, total richness, richness by functional groups, and Shannon diversity) and a large number of variables in 48 afforestation sites in southeast Spain. We considered associated environmental factors, such as geographical, climatic or edaphic variables, age, and land-use history. We compared plant diversity and soil properties following land-use change from cereal cropping to afforestation, which is one of the most common land-use changes in Mediterranean areas. Plant diversity in afforested sites was found to be dependent on previous land use, the proximity of natural vegetation, several soil properties (texture, pH, and total nitrogen), and plantation age. Afforested soils showed higher plant diversity and an improvement in edaphic parameters related to multifunctionality in semiarid ecosystems (i.e., soil organic carbon, nitrogen, and potassium) than arable cropped soils.

Restoration is considered an effective strategy to accelerate the recovery of biological communities at local scale. However, the effects of restoration actions in the marine ecosystems are still unpredictable. We performed a global analysis of published literature to identify the factors increasing the probability of restoration success in coastal and marine systems. Our results confirm that the majority of active restoration initiatives are still concentrated in the northern hemisphere and that most of information gathered from restoration efforts derives from a relatively small subset of species. The analysis also indicates that many studies are still experimental in nature, covering small spatial and temporal scales. Despite the limits of assessing restoration effectiveness in absence of a standardized definition of success, the context (degree of human impact, ecosystem type, habitat) of where the restoration activity is undertaken is of greater relevance to a successful outcom...

Ecological restoration (ER) of terrestrial ecosystems has become widespread in past decades. However, assessing its success is complex mainly due to the diversity of objectives pursued, actions undertaken but also statistical methods for treating data. We demonstrate here that, due to the heterogeneity of collected data, the success of restoration actions can be overestimated in meta-analyses. We advocate analyzing distinctly two types of actions in ER, those aiming at increasing an ecosystem attribute (e.g. species richness of a native plant species, ER +), and those aiming at decreasing it (e.g. invasive species cover, ER-). We also suggest that only one index for assessing the success of a restoration action is not enough. We propose here to complete RR (Remaining Recovery) by a novel index informing on 'what has been restored by comparison to what should have been recovered': the 'Achieved Restoration' index (AR).

The rapid pace of deforestation and fragmentation that took place in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest and other global hotspots for biodiversity conservation has motivated ecosystem restoration efforts. The genetic viability of restored tree populations and their potential to conserve genetic diversity remains, however, unclear. Here, we assessed the genetic viability and potential to conserve the genetic diversity of restored populations of Centrolobium tomentosum, a native legume tree, in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest, based on a genotyping by sequencing (GBS). We have successfully generated a total of 2877 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers across the whole C. tomentosum genome. Surprisingly, restoration sites presented overall higher levels of genetic diversity compared to natural remnant areas and negative inbreeding coefficient (F IS), mainly in juveniles' trees from newer restored areas, indicating an excess of heterozygotes probably due to the founding event. The most likely number of genetic clusters found was two (K = 2), suggesting that diverse seed sources were used to produce seedlings for restoration. Clear signs of gene flow from restored to natural remnants areas had also been detected when diversity values of adults and juveniles were contrasted. Even though we did not find any clear relation of the genetic diversity and landscape composition, the low percentage of forest and high levels of fragmentation are likely reducing patch connectivity in some areas. LOSITAN detected 88 SNP outliers under positive selection, but analysis with Bayescan failed to support this evidence. In conclusion, our post hoc evaluation of restored tree populations indicated that the old restored area is stable and new areas have great potential to contribute to conserving genetic diversity and increasing the chances of the natural populations to persist over time.

The rapid pace of deforestation and fragmentation that took place in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest and other global hotspots for biodiversity conservation has motivated ecosystem restoration efforts. The genetic viability of restored tree populations and their potential to conserve genetic diversity remains, however, unclear. Here, we assessed the genetic viability and potential to conserve the genetic diversity of restored populations of Centrolobium tomentosum, a native legume tree, in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest, based on a genotyping by sequencing (GBS). We have successfully generated a total of 2877 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers across the whole C. tomentosum genome. Surprisingly, restoration sites presented overall higher levels of genetic diversity compared to natural remnant areas and negative inbreeding coefficient (F IS), mainly in juveniles' trees from newer restored areas, indicating an excess of heterozygotes probably due to the founding event. The most likely number of genetic clusters found was two (K = 2), suggesting that diverse seed sources were used to produce seedlings for restoration. Clear signs of gene flow from restored to natural remnants areas had also been detected when diversity values of adults and juveniles were contrasted. Even though we did not find any clear relation of the genetic diversity and landscape composition, the low percentage of forest and high levels of fragmentation are likely reducing patch connectivity in some areas. LOSITAN detected 88 SNP outliers under positive selection, but analysis with Bayescan failed to support this evidence. In conclusion, our post hoc evaluation of restored tree populations indicated that the old restored area is stable and new areas have great potential to contribute to conserving genetic diversity and increasing the chances of the natural populations to persist over time.

Recent studies consider the native flora as a potential source of plant candidates for phytostabilization of metal and metalloid (MM) contaminated soils, but ecological restoration is not the main objective of these researches. However, in contaminated areas, phytostabilization should be considered as a useful tool for ecological restoration. The present study takes stock of 3 years of a Mediterranean pilot site implementation using native plant species to recover plant and microbial communities (diversity and functions) together with soil remediation in the Calanques National Park. To determine the success of this operation, three in situ treatments were compared: ecological restoration plots characterized by the handling of physical environment (creation of cultivation terraces) and plants, negative control plots without vegetation but with the same physical environment handling as ecological restoration plots, and positive control plots with natural vegetation and no *Revised Manuscript Click here to view linked References 2 handling. The results suggest that an ecological restoration trajectory is initiated in the ecological restoration plots, characterized by a partial permanent plant cover. However, there is no evidence of a significant improvement of soil quality (evaluated by soil texture, pH, nutrients and organic carbon contents, cation exchange capacity, microbial biomass and activities) and phytostabilization efficiency after 3 years. Native plant communities and their associated microorganisms may need more time before improving soil quality and MM stabilization under the drastic Mediterranean conditions. Any amendment addition to accelerate restoration and MM immobilization was forbidden in this protected area. Under such conditions, an active restoration need to be carried out in this contaminated area even if resilient dynamics of the native plant communities may sporadically occur over a long period of time.

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Ecological restoration (ER) of terrestrial ecosystems has become widespread in past decades. However, assessing its success is complex mainly due to the diversity of objectives pursued, actions undertaken but also statistical methods for treating data. We demonstrate here that, due to the heterogeneity of collected data, the success of restoration actions can be overestimated in meta-analyses. We advocate analyzing distinctly two types of actions in ER, those aiming at increasing an ecosystem attribute (e.g. species richness of a native plant species, ER +), and those aiming at decreasing it (e.g. invasive species cover, ER-). We also suggest that only one index for assessing the success of a restoration action is not enough. We propose here to complete RR (Remaining Recovery) by a novel index informing on 'what has been restored by comparison to what should have been recovered': the 'Achieved Restoration' index (AR).

Ecological restoration (ER) of terrestrial ecosystems has become widespread in past decades. However, assessing its success is complex mainly due to the diversity of objectives pursued, actions undertaken but also statistical methods for treating data. We demonstrate here that, due to the heterogeneity of collected data, the success of restoration actions can be overestimated in meta-analyses. We advocate analyzing distinctly two types of actions in ER, those aiming at increasing an ecosystem attribute (e.g. species richness of a native plant species, ER +), and those aiming at decreasing it (e.g. invasive species cover, ER-). We also suggest that only one index for assessing the success of a restoration action is not enough. We propose here to complete RR (Remaining Recovery) by a novel index informing on 'what has been restored by comparison to what should have been recovered': the 'Achieved Restoration' index (AR).