Restoration of lowland meadows in Austria: A comparison of five techniques

Sengl, Philipp; Magnes, Martin; Weitenthaler, Karin; Wagner, Viktória; Erdős, László; Berg, Christian

doi:10.1016/j.baae.2017.08.004

Cited by 25 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…The method was found to be successful in transferring several target species, but it did not enable the establishment of a grassland community which closely resembled that of the donor sites, even after 11 years of low‐input agricultural management. These findings reflect those of green hay restoration studies in other circumstances, such as on lowland and ex‐arable sites (Sengl et al ; Albert et al ), suggesting that green hay transfer can be a valuable first step in grassland restoration, or can be used more generally to increase the diversity of species‐poor grassland, providing that management is sympathetic. Assuming that the goal is to develop a species‐rich grassland community which is akin to meadows or pastures with little or no agricultural improvement, then it is likely that further interventions will be required to introduce the target species that are not readily transferred by green hay.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Restoration of upland hay meadows over an 11‐year chronosequence: an evaluation of the success of green hay transfer

Sullivan

Hall

Ashton

2019

Restoration Ecology

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Grassland restoration has become a key tool in addressing the drastic losses of seminatural grassland since the mid-twentieth century. This study examined the restoration by green hay transfer of upland hay meadows, a particularly scarce and vulnerable habitat, over an 11-year chronosequence. The community composition of 18 restoration meadows was compared with that of donor reference sites in two study areas in the Pennine region of northern England. The study investigated: differences in community composition between donor and restoration meadows; transfer of upland hay meadow target species; and the effect of time and isolation from neighboring meadows on the community composition of the restoration meadows. Results showed that restoration meadows differed from donor meadows in that some target species were easily transferred whilst others were not found in the restoration meadows, or were at low levels of cover. Time had a significant effect on the community composition of the restoration meadows, but the similarity between restoration sites and donor sites did not increase with time, and the effect of isolation was not significant. The study showed that the green hay transfer method increases botanical diversity and is an important first step in meadow restoration. However, further restoration activity, such as seed addition, is likely to be required if restoration sites are to resemble closely the reference donor sites. Implications for Practice• Green hay transfer is a valuable technique for the first phase of the restoration of upland hay meadows where site conditions and management regimes are favorable. • A limited suite of target species can be successfully transferred using this method but, over time, the meadow community should be monitored to assess fluctuations in key species, and decisions should be taken on how and when to introduce missing target species, e.g. by further seed addition. • The isolation of the restoration site from other similar plant communities does not appear to be a barrier to initial establishment of target species following green hay transfer, although it should be considered in initial decision-making if long-term restoration is to rely on subsequent colonization from existing populations.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Restoration of upland hay meadows over an 11‐year chronosequence: an evaluation of the success of green hay transfer

Sullivan

Hall

Ashton

2019

Restoration Ecology

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“…In our case study, the well-established indices (i.e., similarity to reference sites and the number of target species) offered valuable and conclusive information on restoration success. The results are in line with a previous study (Sengl et al 2017), where restoration methods of the same projects were investigated in a three-year chronosequence since restoration start. That study showed that sod transplantation was the most successful restoration method, followed by hay transfer, while seeding of site specific seed mixtures proved to be less effective.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…In this study performed in South Eastern Austria, we evaluated three well-established techniques for lowland meadow restoration: sod transplantation, hay transfer and seeding (Török et al 2011, Kiehl et al 2010. Based on a previous study (Sengl et al 2017) we measured restoration success through several well established indices: diversity, number of target species, similarity to reference sites (Ruiz-Jaen and Aide 2005, Scotton et al 2012) and compared this result with newly defined indices based on the naturalness indicator values of plants established by Borhidi (1995) for the Pannonian region.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A test of naturalness indicator values to evaluate success in grassland restoration

Sengl¹,

Magnes

Erdős

et al. 2017

Community Ecology

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How should the somewhat vague term of restoration success be measured? This is a critical question rooted in European law, where in fact the creation of proper replacement habitats is a prerequisite for permitting projects that trigger a loss of species or habitats. Previous studies have used indices that relied on a comparison to reference sites, for example the number of a predefined pool of target species or compositional similarity. However, since restoration sites have rarely the same biotic and abiotic conditions as reference sites, plant communities in restored sites will not perfectly match the reference sites. Furthermore, such indices fail when reference sites are lacking or degraded. Hence, there is a need for an alternative approach that evaluates the conservation value of a restored site independently from reference sites. We propose that naturalness indicator values can be an option to measure restoration success. The approach of using naturalness indicator values makes use of the fact that plants are able to indicate environmental parameters, including degradation and regeneration. We compared and measured the restoration success of three well-established methods for grassland restoration (sod transplantation, hay transfer, seeding) with three commonly used indices (diversity, number of target species, similarity to reference sites). The results verified earlier studies and showed that sod transplantation led to the highest restoration success followed by hay transfer and seeding of sitespecific seed mixtures. Further, we used those well-established indices for an evaluation of novel, naturalness-based indices (unweighted and cover-weighted mean naturalness indicator values, the sum of naturalness indicator values). While calculating the means of naturalness indicator values failed to offer conclusive information on restoration success, we could show that the sum of naturalness indicator values was highly correlated with the number of target species and compositional similarity to reference sites. Thus, our case study demonstrated that naturalness indices can be an excellent option to estimate success in grassland restoration. Abbreviations: CWMNN-Cover-weighted mean Naturalness indicator values, DSH-Donor site for hay transfer, DSS-Donor site for sod transplantation, FPFI-Frequency positive fidelity index (Tichý 2005), Simpson-Simpson´s Index, SUMNN-Sum of Naturalness indicator values, TGSpN-Number of target species, UWMNN-Unweighted Mean Naturalness indicator values. Naturalness indicators of grassland restoration 185 similar habitat conditions as compared to available reference sites and (b) are rather close to the reference sites (White and Walker 1997, Valkó et al. 2017).

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“…Also, as a result of fragmentation, many sites are isolated from remnant grasslands, making seed transfer by migration unlikely. Where natural regeneration is unlikely, competition from desirable native species can be introduced using a variety of methods including direct seeding (Cole et al, 2005; Thomas et al, 2019), transfer of threshing material (Baasch et al, 2016) or hay (Sengel et al, 2016), direct drilling (Bakker et al, 2003) and plant plugs (Tikka et al, 2001). Hedberg and Kotowski (2010) reviewed the effectiveness of different revegetation options for fragmented grasslands and found that direct seeding (sowing and broadcasting) to be the most widely used and most effective for introducing species back to semi‐natural systems.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Weed management for landscape scale restoration of global temperate grasslands

et al. 2020

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Globally, temperate grasslands have been significantly degraded as a result of urbanisation, grazing and agriculture. Weeds now dominate most of these ecosystems, resulting in the loss of ecosystem services, reduced carrying capacity for farmers, and reduction of habitat for native plants and animals. This paper reviews the literature relating to temperate grassland restoration efforts across the globe, noting which techniques and combinations have been used successfully to reduce weed dominance and promote native recruitment and establishment. This review concludes that, using a combination of four restoration techniques, provided the highest level of success, with the caveat that, ongoing weed management should be budgeted for in all projects. There is no single optimal method for restoration and weed control, with success depending on specific site conditions and the scope and aims of particular projects. However, any form of target plant transfer was observed to significantly enhance the restoration's success and reduce exotic plant biomass. There is clearly a need for an increase in long‐term monitoring of restoration projects in order to make more confident assumptions.

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Restoration of lowland meadows in Austria: A comparison of five techniques

Cited by 25 publications

References 43 publications

Restoration of upland hay meadows over an 11‐year chronosequence: an evaluation of the success of green hay transfer

Restoration of upland hay meadows over an 11‐year chronosequence: an evaluation of the success of green hay transfer

A test of naturalness indicator values to evaluate success in grassland restoration

Weed management for landscape scale restoration of global temperate grasslands

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