Linking Restoration and Ecological Succession (Springer ... - Inecol

6.4 Habitats: Contrasting Problems and Solutions
In this chapter we focus on aspects of ecological restoration in selected habitats,
based mainly on our personal experience. However, we believe that the
selection of habitats below illustrates the variability and potential for manipulating
succession, and that the generic aspects of these case studies have a wider
applicability.
6.4.1 Succession in Heavily Disturbed Habitats
6.4.1.1 Mining Sites
Mining activity despoils ca. 1% of the land surface (Walker 1999). Technical
reclamation has usually prevailed, consisting of rough manipulations of the
substrates such as remodeling, drainage, and covering the surface using various
organic materials followed by restoration toward either grassland or forest
(Whisenant 1999). Unassisted succession has been rarely included intentionally
as a part of a restoration project. In temperate Europe, for example, unassisted
succession has produced more or less stabilized, seminatural vegetation in 20–
30 years (Wolf 1985, Prach 1987, Kirmer and Mahn 2001). In a comparison of
unassisted succession and technical reclamation schemes on coal spoil heaps in
one of the largest active coal mining districts in Europe (northwestern Czech Republic),
sites with unassisted succession had double the number of plant species
and fewer invasive species (Fig. 6.2). Moreover, no investment was needed compared
to the high costs ($50,000 ha−1 ) of technically reclaimed sites (Hodačová
and Prach 2003). Spoil heaps, which revegetated spontaneously, also provided
better refugia for rare and endangered species and did not exhibit any negative
off-site effects (Benkewitz et al. 2002).
Figure 6.2 A spoil heap from coal mining in northwestern Czech Republic. Unassisted
succession led after 30 years to a diverse and more or less stabilized late successional
stage that harbored double the number of plant species than technically reclaimed heaps
of the same age.
Chapter 6 Manipulation of Succession 127