Piloting restoration initiatives in subtropical scrub forest: specifying areas asserting adaptive management.

Subtropical scrub forests in Pakistan have diminished by about 75% over the last hundred years, mainly due to indiscriminate exploitation and invasion by exotics species. Lack of initiatives, awareness, and research in utilizing the techniques used for accelerating natural forest succession is resulting in further degradation of the remaining forests. To promote active restoration with local communities and governmental authorities, a restoration scheme was piloted between 2010 and 2016 to examine enrichment population effects. Over 4,000 saplings of two woody climax species, Acacia modesta and Olea ferruginea, raised from seeds of local provenance, were planted in three subjectively selected trial plots representing various stages of degradation, covering a total area of about 4 ha. The results showed an overall 46% survival rate, accompanied by natural regeneration. Comparative analyses of the trial plots have shown variations which were strongly site specific, in addition, it also helped in gauging compliance of the site coordinators in implementing restoration measures as an effective management tool. This study provided an opportunity to appreciate the differences in terms of interventions used for implementing ecological restoration across landscape in the degraded scrub forests.

The role of botanic gardens in the science and practice of ecological restoration.

Many of the skills and resources associated with botanic gardens and arboreta, including plant taxonomy, horticulture, and seed bank management, are fundamental to ecological restoration efforts, yet few of the world's botanic gardens are involved in the science or practice of restoration. Thus, we examined the potential role of botanic gardens in these emerging fields. We believe a reorientation of certain existing institutional strengths, such as plant-based research and knowledge transfer, would enable many more botanic gardens worldwide to provide effective science-based support to restoration efforts. We recommend botanic gardens widen research to include ecosystems as well as species, increase involvement in practical restoration projects and training practitioners, and serve as information hubs for data archiving and exchange.