Riparian Forest Restoration Conflicting Goals, Trade-Offs, and Measures of Success 英文参考文献.docVIP

Sustainability 2012, 4, 2334-2347; doi:10.3390/su4092334 OPEN ACCESS sustainability ISSN 2071-1050 /journal/sustainability Article Riparian Forest Restoration: Conflicting Goals, Trade-Offs, and Measures of Success Heather L. Bateman 1,*, David M. Merritt 2 and J. Bradley Johnson 3 1 Arizona State University, Polytechnic Campus, 6073 S Backus Mall, Mesa, AZ 85212, USA 2 USFS Watershed, Fish, and Wildlife CSU Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory NRRC, Fort Collins, CO 80523, USA; E-Mail: dmmerritt@fs.fed.us 3 Colorado State University, Department of Biology, Fort Collins, CO 80523, USA; E-Mail: bjohnson@ * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-Mail: heather.bateman@; Tel.: +1-480-727-1131; Fax: +1-480-727-1236. Received: 29 June 2012; in revised form: 23 July 2012 / Accepted: 1 September 2012 / Published: 19 September 2012 Abstract: Restoration projects can have varying goals, depending on the specific focus, rationale, and aims for restoration. When restoration projects use project-specific goals to define activities and gauge success without considering broader ecological context, determination of project implications and success can be confounding. We used case studies from the Middle Rio Grande (MRG), southwest USA, to demonstrate how restoration outcomes can rank inconsistently when narrowly-based goals are used. Resource managers have chosen MRG for restoration due to impacts to the natural flood regime, reduced native tree recruitment, and establishment of non-native plants. We show restoration “success” ranks differently based upon three goals: increasing biodiversity, increasing specific ecosystem functions, or restoring native communities. We monitored 12 restored and control sites for seven years. Treatments ranked higher in reducing exotic woody populations, and increasing proportions of native plants and groundwater salvage, but generally wor