Final Examination Review Questions

ESRM 473 Restoration Ecology

1. In creating old growth characteristics in eastern forests, which are the older trees that are valued, conifers or deciduous trees?

2. What does a large gap cut into an existing forest gain you as opposed to a small gap?

3. At one site you have saplings of desirable shade-tolerant trees exist; at another site no saplings exist. Which is the better site at which to create a gap?

4. River restoration includes restoration in three zones. What are the zones and what is an example of restoration in each?

5. Give an example of the elements of a river restoration project to restore a channelized stream to normal stream morphology.

6. Why are trees generally absent from grasslands?

7. What are seagrasses?

8. What are two major agents of stress for seagrasses?

9. At what locations in North America is thornscrub common?

10. How do fire and climate combine, over time, to create cycles of growth and disturbance in grasslands?

11. In arid environments, non-native pasture grasses that are actually better adapted to poor conditions than natives have been brought in. How do you restore to maximize natives when the non-natives perform better?

12. What are four primary limits to restoration in deserts?

13. What is the difference in regularity of annual precipitation between hot deserts and cold deserts? How does this impact restoration?

14. If you are going to water in a desert restoration, how much should you water?

15. What are the overriding environmental conditions in the arctic that impact the ways that restoration can be done?

16. What is thermokarst and what has an impact on how serious a disturbance it may become?

17. What impacts do the transportation systems in the arctic have on the environment?

18. An oil-well and storage tank pad has been decommissioned. The pad was eight feet deep and the gravel has now been removed so that there is only one foot of depth above the former tundra. How would you restore this site?

19. What kinds of sites are most sensitive to disturbance in the arctic, and why are they also the most resilient sites?

20. How does the alpine tundra differ from arctic tundra?

21. What are some tools for restoration in the alpine?

22. How serious a threat is camping and associated recreational uses to alpine habitat? If you were manager of a park in the subalpine and alpine zones, and were given the job of restoring an old public campsite, go through the steps that you would take to accomplish the restoration.

23. What are the overriding environmental conditions that might affect your attempts to restore a degraded site in an arid or desert environment?

24. Often, seeding is the only method of restoration that has any chance of being effective in a desert or arid environment. Can you explain why that is so?

25. How does eelgrass reproduce, and how can we take advantage of that for restoration?

26. What kinds of issues/conditions might you be concerned with prior to conducting restoration of an eelgrass meadow? (think about biological/ecological, sociopolitical, physical, or other concerns).

27. Name some ways that the restoration strategy in a thornscrub biome would differ from the strategy used in desert restoration.

28. How has restoration been made more politically palatable in ranching and agricultural country?

29. What is thornscrub?

30. What is a savanna?

31. What environmental and biotic forces are in equilibrium in, and result in the continued existence of, a southwestern oak savanna?

32. Why are there prairies in the Pacific Northwest?

33. Prairies were the first North American ecosystem in which the young field of ecological restoration was practiced. What did the first restorers do to restore the systems?

34. In coastal wetland restoration (salt marshes), dike breaching is often used to re-connect farmland (that was wetland before the diking) with tidal flows. What are some potential problems with this approach?

35. Describe major disturbances or stresses that are induced in marine plant beds as a result of modern practices (urbanization, agriculture, transportation).

36. In freshwater wetland restoration in the Northwest, when do you move earth (dig channels, make depressions, create dikes), and when do you plant?

37. Forest restoration in the Cedar River Watershed, Seattle’s source of drinking water, involves management of existing, young, even-aged forests. Name some of the features that restoration is intended to create (to make the forest have more characteristics of old-growth)?

38. Why is the final water depth critical in a freshly built (or restored) wetland?

39. What are three sources of plant material for eelgrass restoration?

40. What are five major wetland or riparian invasive plant species in the Pacific Northwest?

41. What is the major obstacle to restoration of grazed pastures that have been cleared in tropical moist forests? What are some ways to restore such sites?

42. What are the major impacts of livestock in riparian zones?

43. Reed canarygrass is a major invasive in western Washington riparian floodplains. How does it get started, what are its impacts, and how do managers try to get rid of it?