Date of Award:

12-2025

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Watershed Sciences

Committee Chair(s)

Karin M. Kettenring

Committee

Karin M. Kettenring

Committee

Courtney Flint

Committee

Edward Hammill

Abstract

Ecological restoration is the process of assisting the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded and is dependent on complex and context-specific decisions. The decision-making process influencing restoration is rarely examined alongside ecological processes. There is a need for research that incorporates the social, economic, institutional, and logistical considerations that shape real-world practices, as well as ecological processes. Decisions made by restoration practitioners and land managers (hereon “manager”) are challenged by the lack of information shared regarding the practical constraints (e.g., cost, labor, specialized equipment) they face. Revegetation, particularly in wetlands, poses challenges due to site conditions and degradation history that need consideration alongside practical constraints. Wetlands have suffered significant rates of degradation, are at high risk of invasive species establishment, and benefit from active revegetation to restore native plant communities. Managers tasked with restoring plant communities must choose between multiple revegetation techniques (e.g. seeding, plugs, or sod mat). Each revegetation technique has tradeoffs in cost, labor, and ecological outcome. My thesis investigates how managers make revegetation decisions, identifies the ecological and practical factors that influence those decisions, and evaluates different revegetation techniques on those findings. Following interviews, I found that goals and objectives, capacity, cost, governance and partnership support, site conditions, managing adaptively, and monitoring and evaluation were key decision-making considerations for managers, and that managers strongly prefer peer-to-peer learning opportunities for knowledge exchange. When I evaluated revegetation techniques on manager-identified criteria, I found that no technique outperformed others in all categories (native cover, plant establishment time, installation labor, plant material cost, and equipment needs and cost), highlighting the importance of context-specific assessment of tradeoffs. For instance, seeding is appropriate for large-scale projects with limited budgets and access to specialized equipment. Sod mats are preferred for projects requiring rapid plant establishment. Plugs are ideal when reliable establishment is prioritized, and when large labor sources are available (e.g., volunteer-based projects). These findings offer insight into the complexities of wetland restoration planning and provide practical guidance for selecting revegetation approaches and sharing knowledge with managers.

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Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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