Plant succession and greentree reservoir management: implications for management and restoration of bottomland hardwood wetlands

Abstract

Bottomland hardwood forests are distributed along rivers and streams throughout the central and eastern United States, with the greatest concentration in the Southeast. Past and projected losses of bottomland hardwoods and degradation of remaining stands suggest that habitat management and/or restoration strategies thut target multiple species and multiple uses will be necessary to maintain, enhance, and restore flora and fauna within bottomland hardwood wetlands. A greentree reservoir is a current management strategy that entails manipulating water regimes to provide habitat for wintering waterfowl. We conducted a literature review and synthesis to determine the potential impacts of greentree reservoir management on plant succession within bottomland hardwood wetlands. Greentree reservoirs can impact vegetation establishment through several processes. Despite shortcomings of greentree reservoirs, designs similar to them could be very beneficial in restoring bottomland hardwood plant and animal communities from degraded forests provided water-level control and maintenance are substantially improved. Emulation of natural hydrologic regimes, including natural variability, could produce diverse bottornland hardwood plant communities and provide habitat for a variety of w'ildlife species.

Evaluation of Reforestation in the Lower Mississippi River Alluvial Valley

“…Current and projected demands for pulp fiber and a shrinking land base in BLH suggest that shorter rotation times and other intensive forest management measures may further impact the structure, composition, and overall habitat quality of the remaining BLH on private lands ( U.S. Forest Service 1988; Wigley & Roberts 1994; King & Allen 1996). Both the continued loss and degradation of southern forested wetlands and the length of time required for reforestation tracts to reach maturity indicate the importance of protection and intensive habitat management of existing forests and other habitats in meeting the needs of a variety of wildlife species ( Fredrickson & Laubhan 1994; Llewellyn et al 1996; Reinecke & Baxter 1996; Fredrickson 1997).…”

“…Restoration or management of local hydrology would obviously be beneficial in many situations, although in others, the lack of broad‐scale hydrologic restoration (e.g., Mississippi River flooding) would limit the effectiveness of any localized efforts. Local hydrologic restoration or management could potentially be accomplished by a number of means such as placing small water‐control structures in natural drainages and creating ridge and swale topography ( Barry et al 1996; Deitz et al 1996; King & Allen 1996). Sites that have high geomorphological heterogeneity under natural conditions tend to support significantly higher plant species richness and diversity ( Burnett et al 1998; Nichols et al 1998).…”

Bottomland hardwood forest recovery following tornado disturbance and salvage logging

“…Following decades of highly variable hydrologic conditions, fire, and agriculture-related practices, these areas are typically dominated by several decades-old stands of mixed species bottomland hardwood forests (Nelson et al, submitted for publication). Uncontrollable natural disturbance on these typically passively managed sites, such as wind events, can drastically alter stand structure and create rare opportunities for the development of a new regeneration cohort (King and Allen, 1996). Following such disturbances managers must determine appropriate course of action to ensure that conservation and public access management objectives are satisfied (Meadows and Stanturf, 1997).…”

Plant community establishment following drawdown of a reservoir in southern Arkansas, USA

“…Early reports on the effects of GTRs indicated either no impacts or positive impacts of the flooding regime on tree health and mast production (Broadfoot 1958;Merz and Brakhage 1964;Broadfoot 1967). Later studies, however, demonstrated long-term negative impacts of GTR management on forest composition and structure (Malecki et al 1983;Young et al 1995;King and Allen 1996;King et al 1998;Fredrickson 2005;Gray and Kaminski 2005;Ervin et al 2006), including a shift to more flood-tolerant species and reduced woody species regeneration. Moist-soil management practices involve manipulating water depth and flooding duration and seasonality within impoundments to stimulate growth of herbaceous plants from seeds or tubers present in the soil, thereby maximizing food production (Reineke et al 1989).…”