Peatland restoration in North America (NA) was initiated approximately 25 years ago on peat‐extracted bogs. Recent advances in peatland restoration in NA have expanded the original concepts and methodology. Restoration efforts in NA now include restoring peatlands from many diverse types of disturbances (e.g. roads, agriculture, grazing, erosion, forestry, and petrol industry infrastructure impacts) and occur in a greater array of peatland types (e.g. fens and swamps). Because fens are groundwater and surface flow driven, techniques to restore the hydrology of fens are generally more complicated than bogs. Restoring a greater variety of peatland types on a large‐scale basis (>10 ha) commands new techniques for reestablishing a broader array of plants other than Sphagnum spp., including non‐Sphagnum mosses, sedges, nonericaceous shrubs, and trees. The rationale for restoring peatlands has expanded to include legal requirements, wetland mitigation and banking, climate mitigation, water quality, and as part of responsible ecosystem management for industry or society. In the past 25 years, peatland restoration in NA has evolved from (1) trial and error to a more empirically based scientific approach, (2) small site‐specific experiments to landscape‐scale restoration (e.g. hydrological connectivity, ecological fragmentation), and (3) individual stakeholder (academic) to multiple stakeholders across jurisdictional boundaries (private, local, and regional governmental agencies, NGOs, and so on). However, many research gaps still exist that must be addressed to enhance our ability to restore peatlands successfully.

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The purpose of this study was to determine how drainage impacts carbon densities and recent rates (past 50 years) of vertical accretion and carbon accumulation in southeastern forested peatlands. We compared these parameters in drained maple‐gum (MAPL), Atlantic white cedar (CDR), and pocosin (POC) communities in the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge (GDS) of Virginia/North Carolina and in an intact (undrained) CDR swamp in the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge (AR) of North Carolina. Peat cores were analyzed for bulk density, percent organic carbon, and 137Cs and 210Pb. An uncertainty analysis of both 137Cs and 210Pb approaches was used to constrain error at least partially related to mobility of both radioisotopes. GDS peats had lower porosities (89.6% (SD = 1.71) versus 95.3% (0.18)) and higher carbon densities (0.082 (0.021) versus 0.037 (0.009) g C cm−3) than AR. Vertical accretion rates (0.10–0.56 cm yr−1) were used to estimate a time period of ~84–362 years for reestablishment of peat lost during the 2011 Lateral West fire at the GDS. Carbon accumulation rates ranged from 51 to 389 g C m−2 yr−1 for all sites. In the drained (GDS) versus intact (AR) CDR sites, carbon accumulation rates were similar with 137Cs (87GDS versus 92AR g C m−2 yr−1) and somewhat less at the GDS than AR as determined with 210Pb (111GDS versus 159AR g C m−2 yr−1). Heightened productivity and high polyphenol content of peat may be responsible for similar rates of carbon accumulation in both drained and intact CDR peatlands.

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