I manage two very different forests in Mauritius, which we are restoring and I would be keen to learn other techniques to tackling invasive weeds as well as different approaches. We learn a lot from applying successional theory and also trying different techniques, but I would like to know if anyone has published a handbook that is applicable to oceanic or tropical forest management.
I'm not an expert in such matter, but I could obtain recently (thanks to the authors) a copy of an interesting book about a experience of forest restoration in Scotland, THE CARRIFRAN WILDWOOD STORY, written by Myrtle and Philip Ashmole. I consider it a good example of forest restoration, with a lot of practical and useful information...
Thank you. I will check it out. I know that forest restoration work is very site specific, but it would be good to learn about different techniques tried elsewhere for invasive weed management. Cheers.
Hi again. You can visit the website of the CARRIFRAN WILDWOOD PROJECT; see:
http://www.carrifran.org.uk/
A.Y. Goor. 1955. Tree planting practices for arid areas. FAO Forestry Development Papers. vi + 126 pp., illustrations. Rome.
(It is rather old but very useful book on tree plantations for arid regions).
Joining the Society for Ecological Restoration would be useful. They also have a society written book which is very helpful. With respect to invasive weeds, using successional theory is useful. Another slowly emerging field is the application of food web theory. Once food web dynamics are better understood then food web approaches could be applied to either (or both) reduce the invasive or increase the stability/resilience of your restored food web against the influence of the invasive.
I think you can find some examples here (Section 5):
http://idl-bnc.idrc.ca/dspace/bitstream/10625/41689/1/129387.pdf
This one is not tropical but - quite practical:
http://www.forestlandscaperestoration.org/sites/default/files/resource/14._wwf_2011_forest_restoration_guidelines.pdf
Kindly refer to Special issue of Springer journal 'New Forests' (volume 43) on Forest Restoration published in 2012 (published online in JUne 2012). There are 27 good articles on Forest Restoration work..
Have a look at this, it is a very good guide to the principles of restoring indigenous vegetation. NZ and Mauritius probably don't have much in common but the basic ideas will hold true for most places. Eco-sourcing, nurse crops, utilising weeds, planting patterns, site preparation etc should be much the same where ever you go just need to adapt to local species and processes.
http://www.openspace.org.nz/Site/Publications_resources/Handbooks_and_Guides.aspx
Thanks Graeme. That is much appreciated. I have also bought Restoring tropical forests: a practical guide by Elliot et al. It is always good to get as much information as possible and ideas about how to improve our cost-effectiveness or what different approaches we could use.
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