Welcome to the homepage of the Restoration Ecology
Research Group of the Institute of Ecology and Botany, Centre for Ecological Research.
Restoration ecology combines ecological theory and practical applications leading to restoration of disturbed, degraded or completely damaged ecosystems (see more at Society for Ecological Restoration).
We investigate the spontaneous regeneration capacity and the restoration possibility of Pannonian sand grasslands. The group also aims to disseminate the ideas of restoration ecology and to positively influence the national and international policy.
David Cevallos received his PhD certificate in Quito, Ecuador at the Hungarian embassy. His doctoral research was: 'Delineation of seed transfer zones based on Ecological knowledge and testing by seed traits of populations from different provenance for ecological restoration use'. Congratulations to David!
Ecological restoration started in France in the 1860's with the program "Restauration des Terrains en Montagnes" in order to recover vegetation cover to prevent erosion in mountain areas. Since then, and especially from the early 2000's other restoration projects have been implemented in various ecosystems and with various approach and objectives....
Open days for university students were held at the Centre for Ecological Research on October 28, 2022. Melinda Halassy presented the research activities of our group and how the students can get involved in ongoing research. The presentation can be downloaded below in Hungarian.
In order to find the best and most reliable practices for ecological restoration of degraded lands, longer time scales should be considered when evaluating restoration efforts. We assessed the long-term (16 years) effects of different grassland restoration treatments - seeding, mowing, and carbon amendment - in the Pannonian sand grasslands. After...
Restoration prioritization helps determine optimal restoration interventions in national and regional spatial planning to create sustainable landscapes and maintain biodiversity. Here we investigate different forest-steppe vegetation types in the Pannonian sand region to provide restoration recommendations for conservation management, policy and...
Presenters: Kris Decleer, Research Institute for Nature and Forests-Flanders (INBO)
On 19-21 September 2022, we did the mowing and seeding of native grassland species (Festuca vaginata, Galium verum, Gypsophila paniculata, Saponaria officinalis) part of our new field experiment: 'Seed-based restoration to prevent the establishment and spread of invasive species'.
This is the first Autumn, and the 6th of the webinar series by SER Europe in 2022 - A SER Europe member will lecture us on the State of Ecological Restoration on her/his Country, followed by a Q&A and a conclusion on best practices and further research+innovation networking.
Agri-environment schemes (AES) are valuable instruments to support pollination in agricultural landscapes. Evaluating AES based on their effects on pollinators has high practical relevance for agricultural production and nature conservation. In our two-year assessment, we studied the effectiveness of two AES (organic farming vs flower strips) on...
Between 18 and 20 July we built a second foil tent and replanted our seeding experiment native (Festuca vaginata, Galium verum, Gypsophila paniculata, Saponaria officinalis) and non-native plants (Asclepias syriaca, Conyza canadensis, Tragus racemosus) to flowerpots twice the size of the previous ones, since some species grew significantly. We had...
Between July 7-15 our research group completed the fieldwork related to the study which examine the impact of the landscape structure on restoration success. We made vegetation samplings on five restoration project sites and within the 500 m radius of the surrounding landscape in the Kiskunság sandy region. We hope that the collected data from the...
On 22 June 2022, the European Commission proposed the first-ever legislation that explicitly targets the restoration of Europe's nature, to repair the 80% of European habitats that are in poor condition, and to bring back nature to all ecosystems, from forest and agricultural land to marine, freshwater and urban ecosystems. Under this proposal...
On June 8, 2022, our group was attended a field workshop in Hortobágy, Hungary. The main topic was how to reconstruct the unique loess grasslands in locations Kungyörgy, Kapróhát, Egyek, Tiszacsegei Széles-halom and Öt-halom.