Premium
Factors Affecting the Restoration of Heathland and Acid Grassland on Pteridium aquilinum –Infested Land across the United Kingdom: A Multisite Study
Author(s) -
Cox Emma S.,
Marrs Robert H.,
Pakeman Robin J.,
Le Duc Michael G.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
restoration ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.214
H-Index - 100
eISSN - 1526-100X
pISSN - 1061-2971
DOI - 10.1111/j.1526-100x.2007.00326.x
Subject(s) - pteridium aquilinum , bracken , vegetation (pathology) , grassland , environmental science , plant community , forestry , restoration ecology , agroforestry , ecology , agronomy , geography , biology , ecological succession , medicine , fern , pathology
The variability in the success of Pteridium aquilinum (bracken) control and vegetation restoration has been highlighted as a major issue in the United Kingdom. Experiments were set up at four different regional locations to assess bracken control at the national scale and the impact of restoration practices at the local scale. Bracken control treatments (cutting once or twice per year, a combination of cutting and asulam spraying, and asulam in year 1) were combined with site‐specific treatments designed to restore appropriate heathland or acid grassland vegetation. This article considers the effects on the developing understorey vegetation, testing the following hypotheses: (1) local differences between sites would affect community change; (2) treatments applied to control Pt. aquilinum (same at all sites) influences community change; and (3) treatments applied at the individual site level to restore vegetation influences community change toward the target vegetation. There were a considerable number of spatial effects. It is, therefore, difficult to develop a one‐size‐fits‐all policy for vegetation restoration within a national Pt. aquilinum control strategy. Few bracken control treatment effects were found, and, where they were detected, it was only at single sites. Thus, the development of target vegetation requires a combination of control and restoration treatments that take into consideration the aspects of that site. Only three species, Deschampsia flexuosa , Galium saxatile , and Campylopus introflexus , increased as a direct effect of the control treatments. Vegetation restoration was most successful in the cutting‐twice‐per‐year plots, the treatment with the greatest reduction in Pt. aquilinum cover.