Framework for Ecological Restoration - Project Planning and Management for Ecological Restoration - page 9

FIGURE 1-3. The forest on the left illustrates the results of a prescribed fire regime, with a higher species
diversity and a lower tree density. Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Lucy Chamberlain.)
practice and harvesting of heath for hundreds of years in Great Britain. The resulting ecosystem is
composed of numerous sensitive and localized species. Here, fire is needed to keep the pines from
taking over, an effort to maintain a specified succession stage. This strategy requires the site being
degraded partially but not to the point where the natural resilience of the ecosystem is damaged
beyond self-regeneration. By returning fire as an element within the ecosystem, nutrient cycling and
other processes are promoted. Fire has been gradually introduced into many of the forests of North
America to encourage regeneration of woodland species (fig. 1-3).
Another example of a management strategy is changing livestock grazing practices in the west-
ern regions of North America. Reduction of cattle stocking levels and exclusion or seasonal control
of cattle grazing in riparian and meadow areas have allowed the regeneration of the diverse plant
communities and native wildlife populations. Shifting the livestock controls overgrazing and sec-
ondary impacts, such as soil erosion alongside mountain streams.
Other management strategies include controlling water elevations or managing the rise and fall
of water to enhance or impede species, and periodic weeding to reduce competition or to permit
germination of native seed banks.
Sometimes restoration projects are undertaken for the sole purpose of addressing one species or
element of an ecosystem. The practice of live trapping brown-headed cowbirds (fig. 1-4) through-
out midwestern and western North America has resulted in population stabilization or increases
of the Kirtland's warbler in the Midwest, of the black-capped vireo in Texas, and of the least Bell's