Landscape ecology and restoration of degraded ecosystems
景观生态学与退化生态系统恢复

The ecological restoration of degraded ecosystem is a difficult undertaking which requires a global and long-term view of the structure, diversity, functioning and dynamics of the ecosystem in question. The study of degraded ecosystem has alerted ecologists to some of the problems associated with both the practical and the theoretical issues of rehabilitating damaged ecosystems. The challenge of degraded system restoration is to understand and exploit the principles of ecological succession at all stages, by complementing and accelerating the processes of colonization and regeneration. The main aim is to construct self-sustaining, appropriate ecosystems, connected in the landscape, that meet conservation, landscape and crop production goals. A landscape-level approach may be useful in addressing restoration topics that are of both theoretical and practical concern. Landscape ecology focuses on questions typically related to broad spatial scales. Landscape approach embraces spatial heterogeneity, consisting of a number of ecosystems and landscape structures of different types, as a central theme. Landscape ecology theories such as landscape heterogeneity and patterns theory, distribution and scale theory can guide the practice of restoration. Landscape studies may aid restoration efforts in a variety of ways, including provision of better guidance for selecting reference sites and establishing project goals and suggestions for appropriate spatial configurations of restored elements to facilitate recruitment of flora/fauna. Likewise, restoration efforts may assist landscape-level studies, given that restored habitats, possessing various patch arrangements or being established among landscapes of varying diversity and conditions of human alteration, can provide extraordinary opportunities for experimentation over a large spatial scale. Restoration studies can facilitate the rate of information gathering for expected changes in natural landscapes for which introduction of landscape elements may be relatively slow. Moreover, data collected from restoration studies can assist in validation of dynamic models of current interest in landscape ecology. We submit that restoration and landscape ecology have an unexplored mutualistic relationship that could enhance research and application of both disciplines.