Defining Reference Conditions for Restoration of Riparian Plant Communities: Examples from California, USA

/ Currently, there is an emphasis on restoration of riparian vegetation in the western United States. Deciding on what and where to restore requires an understanding of relationships between riparian plant communities and their environments along with establishment of targets, or reference conditions, for restoration. Several methods, including off-site data and historical analysis have been used for establishing restoration reference conditions. In this paper, criteria are proposed for interpreting reference community composition and structure from the results of multivariate cluster analysis. The approach is illustrated with data from streams in the California Sierra Nevada, Central Valley, and southern coastal region to derive descriptions of reference communities for stream reaches and floodplain landforms. Cluster analysis results can be used to quantify the areas of both degraded and reference communities within a floodplain, thereby facilitating restoration cost estimation.KEY WORDS: Riparian vegetation; Watershed planning; Riparian restoration; Cluster analysishttp://link.springer-ny.com/link/service/journals/00267/bibs/24n1p55.html