Vocabulary:

• Reclamation: returning a piece of damaged or unused land to a more productive state. Notably, reclamation refers to measures taken to alleviate problems, even if it creates an ecosystem different from the original.
• Restoration: returning a habitat, environment, or ecosystem to its original condition or membership, prior to a disturbance (often anthropogenic)
• Rewilding: conservation effort focused on restoring sustainable biodiversity and ecosystem health by connecting and preserving wild areas (that have not been significantly modified by human activity or used for agriculture), and protecting or reintroducing keystone species/apex predators.

Outline of Notes:

• General rules of context:
  • Diversity hotspots in hills and low mountains, resulting from speciation associated with different altitudes
  • Rock type/geologic history and landcover
  • Latitude and longitude affect patterns
• Different goals of restoration and reclamation:
  • Reclamation: prioritize increasing ecosystem functioning, not structure
  • Restoration: return ecosystem to its original state as much as possible

→ Ideal, but usually not realistic

• Rewilding: conservation effort focused on restoring sustainable biodiversity and ecosystem health by connecting and preserving wild areas, and protecting or reintroducing keystone species/apex predators.
  • Goals:
    • Slow/prevent extinctions
    • Restore ecosystem health
    • Minimize dependence on human intervention and management
      • Let nature take care of itself to restore damaged ecosystems

What Does the Future Look Like?

• Anthropogenic influences shape ecology
• Some species will thrive due to these anthropogenic influences
• These species share common characteristics