SER2013 Conference Website Launched!

The Society for Ecological Restoration in Washington D.C. is seeking an Executive Director

SER Releases New Brochure on the Economics of Restoration at CBD Scientific Meeting

Bioneers: Large-Scale Ecological Restoration Video/Discussion - January 11, 2012

EcoSummit 2012 - Call for Abstracts Deadline January 20, 2012

Louisiana: Help Restore a Floodplain! -Jan 28 & Feb 24, 2012
The Nature Conservancy and US-Fish & Wildlife Service are looking for 50 volunteers (at least) per day to help them plant over 10,000 trees at the Upper Ouachita Wildlife Refuge in Louisiana.

Strategies of Landscape-Scale Restoration in the Tropics-New Haven, CT-January 26-28, 2012
The Yale Chapter of the International Society of Tropical Forests is holding their 18^th Annual Conference in New Haven, Connecticut. The conference is free and open to the public. Registration closes Jan 15^th.

Mangrove Forest Ecology, Management and Restoration Course - Florida, USA - March 1-2, 2012

Nominations now open for 2012 Thiess International Riverprize - Application Closes March 16, 2012

ER Special Issue on Corridor Restoration - Call for Papers April 1, 2012

The 8th Conference of the Society for Ecological Restoration - Europe- September 9-14, 2012

2012 Conference Listingon the Global Restoration Network (GRN)
Check out our 2012 conference listing for a full year view of upcoming conferences and meetings

SER Members receive 25% off Island Press book purchases. Contact caroline@ser.org for details!

Environmental Priorities to Dominate UN Chief's Second Term
 Ban Ki-moon began his second five-year term as secretary-general of the United Nations on Sunday with environmental issues high on his list of priorities. "We have to connect the dots among climate change, food crisis, water scarcity, energy shortages and women's empowerment and global health issues. These are all interconnected issues," said Ban in an interview with the UN News Centre and UN Radio on December 27, 2011.

For the Forest and ACES merge
 "For the Forest's existing programs of forest stewardship and education fit well with ACES programs, including our school and naturalist programs," he said. "They will enhance our ability to educate the public about the importance of ecological restoration, and will augment our local projects as positive examples for the region and beyond."

Sinners, repent! How our natural self-bias got us into this mess
 A conversation with conservation biologist Michael Soule, the founder of the Society for Conservation Biology and The Wildlands Network and a professor emeritus of environmental studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz. In recent years, in pursuit of an ultimate explanation for human reluctance to protect biodiversity, Soule has turned his attention to the seven deadlies, examining their history and evolution as both a scientist and a longtime Buddhist practitioner. I spoke with Soule at his home in western Colorado.

Arcata Community Forest a model for cooperation
 Often the difference between ecological restoration projects that get done and those that don't is well-informed, engaged community. A recently published book takes an interdisciplinary look at how to optimize human involvement in ecological restoration projects, and it uses the Arcata Community forest as an example of effective community-based management. The book, "Human Dimensions of Ecological Restoration: Integrating Science, Nature, and Culture," is edited by Dave Egan, Evan E. Hjerpe and Jesse Abrams, and it features a chapter by Arcata Environmental Services Director Mark André.

Invertebrates the signature foundation species for ecological restoration
 "Invertebrates are really important because they make up 95 per cent of the different species of animals we find on land today and they're involved in numerous ecological functions and processes such as cycling the nutrients or breaking leaves down. These processes release nutrients and break up the soil profile, letting in air and water to the roots of the plants," says Prof Majer.

The contribution of trees to our lives: it is time to take stock
 Give me a tree and I'll save the world - that is the message that comes across from a book just published by the French botanist Francis Hallé, Du bon usage des arbres (Making good use of trees). The book is a defence of trees addressed to decision-makers and town planners. It is hard to know which specific tree to start with, but let's take as our prime example the plane tree planted by the Comte de Buffon in 1785 at the entrance to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. Visitors can see how well it has fared 226 years on, even though it has never been pruned.

California: Project aims to show crops, marshland can coexist
 The conversion to wetland of the rice paddy at Knaggs Ranch, north of Woodland next to the Yolo Bypass, is an experiment that conservationists hope will eventually lead to the restoration of ancient floodplains all along the Sacramento and San Joaquin River corridors.

Coastal Bend farmers, ranchers could get part of $50 million for watershed purification projects
 Reducing the flow of fertilizers and pesticides - typically nitrogen and phosphates - into watersheds and river basins that feed the Gulf is one of several strategies rolled out this month by state and federal officials charged with heading up the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force.

UK: Hedgerows can be managed better for wildlife
 Hedgerow berries are an essential food for small mammals and birds, including blackbirds, fieldfares and redwings, and their flowers provide nectar for pollinating insects. When and how often hedges are trimmed makes a big difference to the amount of both flowers and berries they produce.

India: Call for restoration of Sindh`s forests, wetlands
Nasir Panhwar of the Indus For All programme said that the diverse levels of participation leading to an integrated approach towards conservation were established. He said that the programme was aimed at demonstrating participatory natural resource management practices for poverty alleviation and biodiversity conservation. He said that a number of milestones had been attained in the areas of natural resource management, livelihood development, policy making and capacity building for the conservation of the Indus eco-region.

Romania Pledges to Protect Its Virgin Forests
Virgin forests in Romania will receive the status of protected areas and the Romanian Ministry of Environment and Forests will work with the global conservation organization WWF to identify, map and protect virgin forests. These actions are specified in the Memorandum of Understanding signed Tuesday by the Minister of Environment and Forests Laszlo Borbely and WWF two months after the launch of WWF's campaign to save Romania's virgin forests.

India: Barren forest land regenerated at Bhairabkunda
In a development that holds hope for long-term conservation amid the gloom of large-scale deforestation in the State, communities of six hamlets on the Indo-Bhutan border at Bhairabkunda joined hands with the Forest Department in successfully regenerating a stretch of barren forest land.

New Hampshire gets grant for oyster restoration
 Efforts to restore the native oyster population in Great Bay recently got a welcome financial boost. The state chapter of The Nature Conservancy has received a $24,000 grant from the New Hampshire Conservation License Plate Program to help rebuild an oyster reef at the mouth of the Squamscott River in Newmarket.

Louisiana: Partners hope to help restore Mollicy floodplain
 "Reconnecting the river is one step," said Don McDowell of The Nature Conservancy. "The other is the interior restoration." That began in the 1990s, when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service replanted 10,000 acres with original, indigenous hardwoods like cypress, water tupelo, overcup oaks, willow oaks, Nuttall oaks, cherrybark oaks, green ash and mayhaws. Last year, 3,000 more acres were planted.

Video: Grassland Restoration - A Good News Story
 Seth Itzkan reporting on grassland restoration at the Africa Center for Holistic Management in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. September, 2011.

Audio: Original Prairie Plants Being Restored At San Jacinto Monument
 The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is restoring 110 acres of tall-grass prairie at the San Jacinto Battleground. That will help the historic site retain the same tall grasses that were there during the Texas Revolution

First Gulf Coast Restoration Projects Selected for BP $1 Billion
 Restoration of oyster beds, marshes, dunes and nearshore reefs damaged by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico are among the first set of projects proposed today for funding under the $1 billion BP agreed to set aside for early restoration projects.

Philippines: Agriculture chief unveils program to increase fish production
 The Department of Agriculture is embarking on a multi-million peso project to be funded by the Aquino administration's economic stimulus fund that would increase fish production in coastal towns through rehabilitation of mangrove forests and give rural families additional income.

Everglades Restoration: Parties Produce Miracle
 A bipartisan effort in Washington, and cooperation between the federal government and Florida, led Congress to authorize $142 million for Everglades-related projects recently. The federal spending bill allocates about $97 million to restoration in the Glades and the balance to the Kissimmee River, which flows into Lake Okeechobee. The river and lake were parts of the original Everglades system.

Florida: DEP approves Okaloosa Island beach restoration
 Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Herschel T. Vinyard issued a final order Thursday approving the permit to restore the beach on Okaloosa Island. Vinyard's decision gives Okaloosa County permission to complete the $12 million restoration of 2.9 miles of public beach. The controversial project would add about 913,000 cubic yards of sand dredged from the Gulf of Mexico to the beach.

After 85-year Absence, Wolves Return to California
 For the first time in more than 85 years, a gray wolf has been documented in California. The 2 ½-year-old male, known as OR-7, journeyed more than 700 miles from the northeastern corner of Oregon, crossing into California's Siskiyou County on Wednesday, according to the California Department of Fish and Game. OR-7, and any other wolves that wander into California, are federally protected by the Endangered Species Act.

US: Stitching habitat together across public and private lands
 In some places, environmentalists or public agencies have identified important corridors, and then worked to enlist landowners in protecting them. But from the Mexican border to the Crown of the Continent, where the U.S. and Canadian Rockies meet, a growing number of landowners are showing their own initiative, banding together to protect working land from development, and to link migration and dispersal routes across jurisdictional boundaries. Many conservationists say that the future of large-landscape conservation lies in these efforts.

World pays Ecuador not to extract oil from rainforest
 An alliance of European local authorities, national governments, US film stars, Japanese shops, soft drink companies and Russian foundations have stepped in to prevent oil companies exploiting 900m barrels of crude oil from one of the world's most biologically rich tracts of land.

China: Fund established for marine environment
 That fund will cover projects for marine ecological environment protection as well as related scientific research, technological development and other charitable projects. Detailed projects will include those related to ecological restoration and sustainable development arising from oil and gas exploration activities and natural disasters, and restoration and protection of the marine ecosystem.

UK: Wentwood Forest near Newport 'recovering well'
 A charity which raised £1.5m to buy the largest ancient woodland in Wales and save it from commercial forestry says its restoration is going well. Wentwood Forest near Newport was bought by Woodland Trust six years ago with aid from 15,000 supporters like actress Judi Dench and author Bill Bryson. It has removed thousands of conifers to make room for native species of trees such as oak, beech and hazel.

Washington: 47 trees vandalized in Beaver Pond Natural Area
 Here is a clash between urban forest restoration and neighborhood security gone awry, a devastating loss for the Thornton Creek restoration community. ... For about two decades volunteers have been at work restoring this site as a functioning urban forest/park.  They have spent hundreds of hours  of their 'free time' weeding out invasive plants and replacing them with native plants and trees.

Jamaica: Hazard Mitigation Funds to Rescue Tourist Mecca
 The National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA), the agency responsible for the management and protection of the island's 1,022 kilometres of coastline, has begun the replanting of sea grass beds and mangrove forests in Negril as well as Montego Bay and Portland Bight. The agency said these areas have been severely impacted by the large-scale removal of coastal vegetation.

USDA Great Lakes Restoration Initiative-Closes Jan 15, 2012
 The USDA Forest Service Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) is the largest investment in the Great Lakes in two decades. A task force of 11 federal agencies developed an action plan to implement the initiative. This action plan covers fiscal years 2010 through 2014. Funded topics include: cleaning up toxics and areas of concern; combating invasive; promoting watershed protection; wetland & habitat restoration; tracking progress and working with strategic partners. The next submission dates for funding recipients are from January 1-15, 2012.

US: WaterSMART Water and Energy Efficiency Grant Funding Opportunity, Closes: Jan 19, 2012
 The Bureau of Reclamation is seeking proposals from states, Indian tribes, irrigation districts, water districts and other organizations with water or power delivery authority to partner with Reclamation on projects that increase water conservation or result in other improvements that address water supply sustainability in the West.

Arkansas landowners Wetlands Reserve Program - Closes Jan 27, 2012
State Conservationist Mike Sullivan with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service says Arkansas is second in the nation in the program's wetland restoration, with more than 200,000 acres restored.

Australia: New South Wales (NWS) Environmental Trust Grants-Closes Jan 31, 2012
The NSW Environmental Trust is an independent statutory body established by the NSW government to support exceptional environmental projects that do not receive funds from the usual government sources. Community groups are now invited to apply for funding for large-scale bush re-generation projects. The Community Bush Regeneration Large Project Stream is offering grants of between $200,000 and $250,000 for projects which will run for up to six years.

US: NFWF Five Star Restoration Grant Program- Closes Feb 15, 2012
 The national Fish and Wildlife Federation (NFWF) Five Star Restoration Program provides modest financial assistance to support community-based wetland, riparian, and coastal habitat restoration projects that build diverse partnerships and foster local natural resource stewardship through education, outreach, and training activities.

US: Washington Dept. of Fish and Wildlife- Closes Fab 29, 2012
The state Department of Fish and Wildlife is accepting grant applications for the Aquatic Land Enhancement Account. The agency expects to award about $180,000 in grants from the program in the coming year. Five types of projects are funded through the program - habitat restoration, research, education and outreach, facility development and artificial production. Applications must be received or postmarked by Feb. 29.

US: Minnesota State Funding Available for Environmental Project-Closes April 6, 2012
The Legislative Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) has issued its 2012-2013 Request for Proposal (RFP) for funding from the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund beginning July 1, 2013. Approximately $31 million is expected to be available for projects being sought in environment and natural resource areas that will provide multiple ecological and other public benefits. Proposals responding to the 2012-2013 RFP are due Friday, April 6, 2012.

US: Emergency Forest Restoration Program
USDA Farm Service Agency's (FSA) Emergency Forest Restoration Program (EFRP) provides payments to eligible owners of nonindustrial private forest (NIPF) land in order to carry out emergency measures to restore land damaged by a natural disaster.

Earth Island Institute: Supporting community-based wetland restoration initiatives
Through the Small Grants Program, Earth Island Institute has been able to support locally based restoration efforts to do just that. Small grassroots efforts to restore the coastal habitats of Southern California, which have been depleted by an astounding 98%, have been slowly working to bring our wetlands back from the brink of extinction. By supporting and empowering the new restoration leaders, we ensure our collective success in restoring some of the earth's most fragile ecosystems.

The Gulf of Mexico Foundation's Community-based Restoration Partnershiphas reached a milestone by providing grants for now more than 75 different projects in coastal areas throughout the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Restoring a total of about 15,000 acres over the past decade, these CRP projects have improved a wide variety of habitat types, including coastal dunes, coral reefs, oyster reefs, marshes, seagrass beds, mangrove forests and artificial reefs. Funding from NOAA and EPA make it possible for the GMF to provided more than $3 million to projects. Other partners have contributed an additional $5.5 million in funding.  The GMF is offering a new round of CRP funding for 2012.

 Terra Viva Grants develops and manages information about grants for agriculture, energy, environment, and natural resources in the world's developing countries. 

 California: Ecosystem Restoration on Agricultural Lands (ERAL)
Grant funding applications are accepted on a year-round basis. The WCB meets four times each year, normally in February, May, August, and November to consider approval of funding for projects.

 Tamarisk Related Grant Opportunities
The Tamarisk Coalition has developed a list of available Grant Opportunities to address tamarisk issues and riparian restoration. This list was revised as part of the Colorado River Basin Tamarisk and Russian Olive Assessment.