Evaluating restoration outcomes: trial of a community-based monitoring protocol

Restoration planting is undertaken widely in rural landscapes to promote more sustainable land use, such as reforesting agricultural land, and to enhance nature conservation. Land managers and community groups have a key role in delivering these actions and can also contribute to monitoring the outcomes. Here, we describe a monitoring protocol developed to assist practitioners to assess the survival of plant species in restoration plantings and report results of a trial of the protocol from 123 monitored plots at 62 sites across Victoria. On average, 61% of plants per site (all species combined) survived and 77% of the species planted persisted after the first summer post-planting. Rates of survival varied considerably among plant species, with differences in outcomes evident across bioregions. Overall, the survival of plantings (all species combined) was greater at sites with higher mean annual rainfall and where plants were protected by guards. Widespread adoption of monitoring will assist project managers to better understand how plants survive and grow, and to adaptively manage revegetation programmes under a changing climate. A co-ordinated monitoring effort will require resources for on-ground monitoring, as well as an online database for data storage, collation, analysis and reporting.