Vegetation development in created, restored, and enhanced mitigation wetland banks of the United States

Spieles, Douglas J.

doi:10.1672/0277-5212(2005)025[0051:vdicra]2.0.co;2

Cited by 90 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 32 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…While all three basins trended toward a more diverse and more hydrophilic community, nonnative species clearly influenced the overall floristic quality in the third year, particularly in Basins 1 and 3. Such variability is common in early successional mitigation wetlands; generally, species influx is much higher in newly created and restored wetlands than in natural systems but this influx declines over the first six years (Spieles 2005). The Dutch Fork data of this study provide a means of assessing the -relative importance of soil, seed bank, hydrologic regime, and proximity to inflow for plant community assortment in the third year.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Early successional vegetation assembly in a spatially variable hydrologic regime

Spieles¹

2013

Journal of Freshwater Ecology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Mitigation wetlands are intended to replace the ecological conditions of wetlands lost to development or drainage, resulting in a theoretical expectation that the replacement wetland will support a species composition and diversity comparable to a reference standard. I analyze a freshwater mitigation wetland in central Ohio, USA to evaluate factors that influence spatial patterns of plant community assembly in terms of floristic quality and diversity. Soil seed bank, bulk density, organic content, and pH are evaluated, along with average depth, exposure time, depth variance, and spatial location within the wetland basins, for their relationship with plant community characteristics in the first three years after wetland creation. The plant community was highly variable during the study period, with general trends toward greater diversity and more hydrophilic vegetation. The spatial distribution of nonnative cover, planted cover, mean coefficient of conservatism, and diversity in the third-year plant community were unrelated to soil and seed bank metrics; however, all were strongly related to hydrologic metrics. Shallow depth (<0.2 m) and moderate depth variance were found to facilitate plant community diversity, while floristic quality is more likely in deep (>0.2 m) and relatively stable water levels (<60% exposure time). Nonnative vegetation cover was particularly high at shallow locations with high depth variance and long exposure times. Geographic analysis of floristic quality and diversity indicates a weak spatial correlation between the two, suggesting that these two measures of the plant community are unlikely to coincide in early succession. The implications are that site design and hydrologic manipulation can drive the early successional vegetation characteristics, and that site design, compliance criteria, and monitoring regimes should seek to concertedly facilitate species composition, community diversity, or both.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Early successional vegetation assembly in a spatially variable hydrologic regime

Spieles¹

2013

Journal of Freshwater Ecology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Balcombe et al [30] and Spieles [31] reported that mitigation wetlands may take years or even decades to mature. Weaver et al [32] also indicated that very low variance in the FAMEs within the constructed wetland after 1 year operation, and reached a greater temporal stability.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Purification efficiencies and microbial community structure of integrated vertical-flow constructed wetland for domestic wastewater treatment during acclimation period

Su-qing

Chang

Dai

et al. 2012

Desalination and Water Treatment

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…Passive revegetation of Southeastern depressions might be less successful on agricultural lands, where drained depressions could have In a single-permit compensatory mitigation, failure to achieve equivalence to natural wetlands is of concern because the mitigation site is replacing a particular lost wetland type either concurrently or "after the fact". A potential advantage of mitigation banks is that if they hold a collection of restored wetlands with good ecological function (hydrology, vegetation, faunal habitat), the regulatory issue shifts to determining if an appropriate wetland type is available "before the fact" for in-kind replacement (Spieles 2005). Regardless of this advantage, the challenge remains that restoration success is rarely a simple yes/no outcome (Zedler and Callaway 2000).…”

Section: Ecological Outcomes Of Passive Restorationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus, these functional wetlands would meet or exceed the ecological performance standards advocated for mitigation-bank success (e.g., Spieles 2005;Reiss et al 2009). …”

Section: Ecological Outcomes Of Passive Restorationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ecological Outcomes and Evaluation of Success in Passively Restored Southeastern Depressional Wetlands

2010

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Depressional wetlands may be restored passively by disrupting prior drainage to recover original hydrology and relying on natural revegetation. Restored hydrology selects for wetland vegetation; however, depression geomorphology constrains the achievable hydroperiod, and plant communities are influenced by hydroperiod and available species pools. Such constraints can complicate assessments of restoration success. Sixteen drained depressions in South Carolina, USA, were restored experimentally by forest clearing and ditch plugging for potential crediting to a mitigation bank. Depressions were assigned to alternate revegetation methods representing desired targets of herbaceous and wet-forest communities. After five years, restoration progress and revegetation methods were evaluated. Restored hydroperiods differed among wetlands, but all sites developed diverse vegetation of native wetland species. Vegetation traits were influenced by hydroperiod and the effects of early drought, rather than by revegetation method. For mitigation banking, individual wetlands were assessed for improvement from pre-restoration condition and similarity to assigned reference type. Most wetlands met goals to increase hydroperiod, herb-species dominance, and wetland-plant composition. Fewer wetlands achieved equivalence to reference types because some vegetation targets were incompatible with depression hydroperiods and improbable without intensive management. The results illustrated a paradox in judging success when vegetation goals may be unsuited to system constraints.

show abstract

Vegetation development in created, restored, and enhanced mitigation wetland banks of the United States

Cited by 90 publications

References 32 publications

Early successional vegetation assembly in a spatially variable hydrologic regime

Early successional vegetation assembly in a spatially variable hydrologic regime

Purification efficiencies and microbial community structure of integrated vertical-flow constructed wetland for domestic wastewater treatment during acclimation period

Ecological Outcomes and Evaluation of Success in Passively Restored Southeastern Depressional Wetlands

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About