Revegetation in agricultural areas: the development of structural complexity and floristic diversity

Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

Authors

Revegetation plantings have been established to ameliorate the negative effects of clearing remnant vegetation and to provide new habitat for fauna. We assessed the vegetation development of revegetation established on agricultural land in Gippsland, southeastern Australia. We compared (1) woodlot plantings (overstory eucalypts only) and (2) ecological plantings (many species of local trees, shrubs, and understory) with remnants and paddocks for development of vegetation structural complexity and colonizing plant species. We also assessed structural complexity and plant species composition in response to several site parameters. Structural complexity increased with age of planting, toward that of remnants, even when very few species were planted at establishment. Richness of all plants and native plants, however, did not increase with age. Native ground cover plants were not included at establishment in either planting type, and their richness also did not increase with age of planting. This indicated that colonization did not occur through time, which does not support the "foster ecosystem hypothesis." Weed species richness was unrelated to native plant richness, which does not support the "diversity-resistance hypothesis." Weed cover increased with age of planting in woodlot plantings but decreased with age in ecological plantings. Richness of all plants and native plants in plantings did not increase with planting size or with the presence of old remnant trees and was greater in gullies and where vegetation cover in the landscape was greater. Structural complexity was unaffected by planting size but was positively correlated with floristic richness. Ecological plantings had higher condition scores, greater shrub cover, more plant life-forms and fewer weeds than woodlot plantings indicating a possible greater benefit as habitat for wildlife. We conclude that ecological plantings can achieve similar overall structural complexity as remnant vegetation within 30-40 years but will not gain a native ground layer and will not necessarily contain some important structural features by this age. Ecological plantings may provide habitat for the conservation of fauna (through the development of structural complexity), but they may not provide for the conservation of non-planted flora (given the absence of re-colonizing smaller life-forms).

Original languageEnglish
JournalEcological Applications
Volume19
Issue number5
Pages (from-to)1197-1210
Number of pages14
ISSN1051-0761
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 07.2009
Externally publishedYes

DOI

Recently viewed

Researchers

  1. Peter Leonhard

Publications

  1. Vibration Converter with Passive Energy Management for Battery‐Less Wireless Sensor Nodes in Predictive Maintenance
  2. Searching for New Languages, Searching for Minor Voices in the Archive
  3. Injection of CO2 for the inhibition of scaling in ATES systems
  4. How Founders Harness Tensions in Hybrid Venture Development
  5. Editorial: Courts in Context. An Empirical Re-Evaluation of Categorization in the Asylum Regime
  6. Microstructure and hardness evolution of laser metal deposited AA5087 wall-structures
  7. Soziale Netzwerkanalyse
  8. Public Value
  9. Utilizing international networks for accelerating research and learning in transformational sustainability science
  10. Biodiversity and Resilience of Ecosystem Functions
  11. Schulleitungsmonitor Schweiz 2022
  12. Internet-Based Guided Self-Help for Vaginal Penetration Difficulties
  13. The Boundary Objects Concept: Theorizing Film and Media.
  14. Knowledge Production in Consulting Teams
  15. The Weinberg-Salam Model of Electroweak Interactions
  16. Spatial scaling of extinction rates
  17. A Glue from Snail Slime?!
  18. A call for statistical editors in ecology
  19. Variational Pragmatics
  20. Heat and light
  21. (Inhibiting) Factors for (Un)Sustainable Behaviour in Relation to the Effects of Education for Sustainable Development
  22. Science, policy and implementation gaps: An exploration of groundwater management in Hungary
  23. Der gegenwärtige Jazzdiskurs in Deutschland
  24. Fixed-term contracts and employment adjustment
  25. Wende überall?
  26. The mimicry of dialogue
  27. Günstigkeitsprinzip
  28. How Organizations Manage the Future
  29. Versuch, Vollendung, Beendigung und Verjährung
  30. Finance is Society!
  31. Short-Chain Chlorinated Paraffins in Zurich, Switzerland
  32. Digitalisierung in der Strahlentherapie 4.0
  33. Is excess mortality higher in depressed men than in depressed women?