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from the heard-good-things-about-oxygen dept.
To find out what works best for reestablishing tropical dry forests, the researchers planted seedlings of 32 native tree species in degraded soil or degraded soil amended with sand, rice hulls, rice hull ash or hydrogel (an artificial water-holding material). After two years, they found that tree species known for traits that make them drought tolerant, such as enhanced ability to use water and capture sunlight, survived better than other species. Some of the soil amendments helped get seedlings off to a good start, but by the end of the experiment there was no difference in survival with respect to soil condition.
"This study is important for a number of reasons," Powers said. "First, it demonstrates that it is possible to grow trees on extremely degraded soils, which provides hope that we can indeed restore tropical dry forests. Second, it provides a general approach to screen native tree species for restoration trails based on their functional traits, which can be applied widely across the tropics.
Is 'ecosystem restoration' the job growth area of the future?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday September 22 2017, @04:44PM (1 child)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_old_growth_forests#United_States [wikipedia.org]
A picture is worth a thousand words - http://www.foresthistory.org/ASPNET/Publications/region/8/crossett/images/fig2.jpg [foresthistory.org]
Just ignore the apparent size of the trees - instead, look at the near absence of undergrowth. Unless you go to a park area in Arkansas, where the undergrowth is controlled, you won't find new growth forests that look like that. Old growth has a special sort of beauty.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday September 22 2017, @10:13PM
On the undergrowth topic, humans eliminating the predators has a nasty side-effect: the herbivores eat all the undergrowth with impunity.
I remember driving past Chicagoland forest preserves, where there are very few leaves below 6-7 feet, because the deer eat everything. The natural selection that should happen when you have nowhere to hide doesn't work.