Restored wetlands like this pond converted from agricultural use in Aragon, Spain, may look natural, but a new study shows that it can take hundreds of years for restored wetlands to accumulate the plant assemblages and carbon resources of a natural, undamaged wetland. Credit: David Moreno-Mateos/UC Berkeley

BERKELEY —Wetland restoration is a billion-dollar-a-year industry in the United States that aims to create ecosystems similar to those that disappeared over the past century. But a new analysis of restoration projects shows that restored wetlands seldom reach the quality of a natural wetland.

“Once you degrade a wetland, it doesn’t recover its normal assemblage of plants or its rich stores of organic soil carbon, which both affect natural cycles of water and nutrients, for many years,” said David Moreno-Mateos, a University of California, Berkeley, postdoctoral fellow. “Even after 100 years, the restored wetland is still different from what was there before, and it may never recover.”

Moreno-Mateos’s analysis calls into question a common mitigation strategy exploited by land developers: create a new wetland to replace a wetland that will be destroyed and the land put to other uses. At a time of accelerated climate change caused by increased carbon entering the atmosphere, carbon storage in wetlands is increasingly important, he said.



Click here to read the full article.
Click here to read archived items.
CAPS BLOG » View all topics
Criminal Alien Fugitive Arrested Working in the United States
» Read More
Teachers, H-1B Visas and the Catch-22
» Read More
Obama’s State of the Union: DREAMing On
» Read More
Two DHS Studies Confirm That Legal Immigration Grinds On
» Read More
CAPS LEGISLATIVE ALERTS » Take action now!
CAPS Cam » View CAPS Videos
screenshot
TV Ads call for slowing legal immigration until California is working again
Terry Anderson interview
Terry Anderson discusses the impact illegal immigration has had on black Americans
Children TV Ad
"If Californians are having fewer children,
where are all the people coming from?"
 

Register to Vote Visit us on Facebook Visit us on Twitter Visit us on YouTube

© 2012 Californians For Population Stabilization