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WATERSHED
RESTORATION (continued - page 2)
Revegetation
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Planting native species of vegetation
in riparian areas stabilizes banks,
limits erosion and creates wildlife
and aquatic habitat.
The NFF works with a host of community
groups, through our Grant Programs, on watershed restoration,
protection and education. |
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| Volunteers in the
Vermont work on removing a bridge and culverts
in an effort to restore this wooded stream.
Photo courtesy of National Wildlife Federation
in Vermont |
Today, land managers are focusing on watershed
restoration, which is the coordinated effort between
land managers and those who live, work and recreate
within that watershed to restore the functions
to damaged watersheds. It is an inexact science
aimed at improving systems that are naturally
always changing. Restoration practitioners have
to learn as they go.
The
goals of watershed restoration include but are
not limited to:
- Improving and restoring the overall health
of a watershed through sustainable management
practices, updated technological practices
and stream, riparian and forest restoration
projects.
- Reducing stresses that cause damage to the
watershed.
- Employing collaboration to give local citizens
more of a say in how their surrounding ecosystems
are managed.
- Increasing the number and quality of jobs
based on the restoration of watersheds in
an ecologically and socially just manner.
- Replanting vegetation in riparian areas.
- Removing invasive species.
- Reconstructing naturally occurring features
that serve specific ecological functions,
such as meanders or woody debris in streams
that help slow moving water.
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