Restoration ecology, although a relatively new concept compared to other disciplines, has gained significant momentum in the last decade as accelerating global change becomes more apparent. It is now widely accepted by the scientific community that to avoid further devastating effects of climate change and biodiversity loss, humanity must determinedly move to protect and restore natural ecosystems. Many previous restoration efforts have been ad hoc site and situation-specific projects, but over the last decade, countries have allocated significant financial investment towards systematic restoration efforts. Indeed, activities related to the restoration of ecosystems, natural assets and biodiversity have now become a global concern. This book covers restoration ecology including grasslands, tropical rainforest conservation, effects of climate change, forest restoration, wetland restoration, urban restoration, farm-based restoration, and arid zone restoration It is also recognised that for badly degraded areas, two or more complementary treatments, undertaken over long time frames, will be necessary. The agreed prescriptions will act to identify effective actions from ad hoc site and situation-specific projects, and to assist in the direction of resources towards evidence-based landscape-scale restoration programs, particularly when integrated with community action. Several ambitious targets for restoration activities have been set at the global level. However, without developing practical guidelines and utilising the lessons learned from evaluations of past restoration efforts into future landscape scale restoration projects, continental scale restoration efforts are unlikely to be successful. This book reviews and highlights the successful restoration stories as a set of case studies which have been conducted using the most systematic restoration ecology techniques in order to provide ecological restoration professionals of the future with state-of-the-art information.

Professor Singarayer Florentine is a restoration and invasive species ecologist, with more than 25 years of experience in research and higher education teaching. He has been specialising in work on ecologically diverse habitats, and has had experience in three different countries. Florentine earned his PhD from Curtin University in Western Australia, and then moved to Queensland where he worked as Weed Scientist with the Tropical Weeds Research Centre. While he was School for Field Studies at the Centre for Rainforest Studies, Queensland, he was involved in several tropical rainforest restoration projects and began to conduct research into weed invasion in fragmented landscapes. Dr Linda Broadhurst recently retired as Director of the Centre for Australian National Biodiversity Research, a joint venture between CSIRO National Research Collections Australia and the Director of National Parks. During Linda's research career her has research interests included conservation and restoration genetics and improving seed collection practices for better restoration outcomes. She also spent many years translating scientific findings to help improve on ground seed collection and use practices to ensure that plantings has a broad genetic base. Dr Paul Gibson-Roy is a restoration ecologist specialising in grassland and grassy woodland communities. Paul has worked with various groups including universities, NGOs, governments and private businesses to increase the focus on the need to protect and restore these communities. His work has included detailed research and field scale implementation of practice. In addition, he has also been keenly involved in better understanding the dynamics and capacity of the broader seed and restoration sectors, in particular around seed production and seed supply chains, to provide effective restoration services. He has spent many years communicating findings from research and practice and advocating for better restoration policy, programs, and outcomes. Professor Kingsley Dixon is a restoration ecologist and conservation biologist, with 40 years of global experience focused on landscape-scale restoration and conservation through community-led practices. He holds positions on international and national boards and commissions including President of the international Society for Ecological Restoration and member of the Task Force on Best Practices for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. Kingsley was awarded the Linnean Medal in 2013 for his significant contribution to the science of natural history