Recovery
According to the SER (2004) définition, ecological restoration assists recovery. What do we mean by recovery? Recovery is a deceptively simple term for a surprisingly complex concept. If we recovered an antique automobile for display, it could remain in i
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Recovery
According to the SER (2004) definition, ecological restoration assists recovery. What do we mean by recovery? Recovery is a deceptively simple term for a surprisingly complex concept. If we recovered an antique automobile for display, it could remain in its refurbished condition indefinitely for all to admire as a gleaming legacy of our industrial past. Unlike a car that was constructed of inert materials, an ecosystem is different. It consists of living organisms that are constantly reacting to each other and to their abiotic environment. As stated in chapter 1, an ecosystem can be restored to its historic trajectory, but it can’t be restored as a replica of a prior state. The reason is that its component plants and animals can’t be fixed in time as if they were pasted onto herbarium sheets or preserved in formalin. Species populations undergo continuous changes in demography— germination or births; deaths; growth and reproduction; migration; evolution and extinction. Ecosystems are constantly changing, at least subtly, with every blink of an eye. Restoration and recovery have different meanings, but they are frequently used interchangeably. According to Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged (1993), restore means to put back or bring back to a former or original state, to rebuild or renovate. Recover means to take back or bring back to normal balance or self-possession—to rescue, cure, heal, or retrieve. According to these definitions, restoration means the return to a former state, whereas recovery means return of former potential and thus anticipation for subsequent activity. With these meanings in mind, you could restore an antique car but not recover it. Conversely, you could recover an impaired ecosystem and bring it back to normalcy or readiness to resume ecological processes, but you could not restore it! We presume it is far too late to suggest that we change the
A.F. Clewell and J. Aronson, Ecological Restoration: Principles, Values, and Structure of an Emerging Profession, The Science and Practice of Ecological Restoration, DOI 10.5822/978-1-59726-323-8_4, © 2013 Andre F. Clewell and James Aronson
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ecological restoration: principles, values, and structure of an emerging profession
name of our discipline to Ecological Recovery. Moreover, the word restoration has proven itself to have enormous value and resonance in languages around the world. Therefore, let us go forward. The SER definition of ecological restoration (SER 2004) states that we only “assist” recovery. This stipulation reminds us that the ecosystem plays a vital role in its restoration. Our intervention supplies the conditions for restoration, but human agency is only one factor in the restoration process. If we were restoring an automobile, we would be engaged in every aspect of restoration until it was ready for display. In ecological restoration, nearly all recovery is accomplished by living organisms. As restorationists we serve only as facilitators for those plants, animals,
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