The Historical Ecology Handbook makes essential connections between past and future ecosystems, bringing together leading experts to offer a much-needed introduction to the field of historical ecology and its practical application by on-the-ground restorationists. Chapters present individual techniques focusing on both culturally derived evidence and biological records, with each chapter offering essential background, tools, and resources needed for using the technique in a restoration effort. The book ends with four in-depth case studies that demonstrate how various combinations of techniques have been used in restoration projects. The Historical Ecology Handbook is a unique and groundbreaking guide to determining historic reference conditions of a landscape. It offers an invaluable compendium of tools and techniques, and will be essential reading for anyone working in the field of ecological restoration. Evelyn A. Howell is Professor and Chairperson with the Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Curt Meine is a writer and conservation biologist. He is author of the biography Aldo Leopold: His Life and Work , editor of the collection Wallace Stegner and the Continental Vision: Essays on Literature, History, and Landscape , and coeditor with Richard L. Knight of The Essential Aldo Leopold: Quotations and Commentaries . He has served on the board of governors of the Society for Conservation Biology and sits on the editorial boards of the journals Conservation Biology and Environmental Ethics. The Historical Ecology Handbook A Restorationist's Guide to Reference Ecosystems By Dave Egan, Evelyn A. Howell ISLAND PRESS Copyright © 2005 Island Press All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-59726-033-6 Contents About Island Press, About the Society for Ecological Restoration International, SOCIETY FOR ECOLOGICAL RESTORATION INTERNATIONAL, Title Page, Copyright Page, Table of Figures, Acknowledgments, Foreword, Preface to the 2005 Edition, Introduction, I - Cultural Evidence, I - Archaeology, Paleoecosystems, and Ecological Restoration, 2 - The Contribution of Ethnobiology to the Reconstruction and Restoration of Historic Ecosystems, 3 - The Pleasures and Pitfalls of Written Records, 4 - Oral History: A Guide to Its Creation and Use, 5 - Maps and Photographs, 6 - Government Land Office Surveys and Other Early Land Surveys, II - Biological Evidence, 7 - Inferring Forest Stand History from Observational Field Evidence, 8 - Using Dendrochronology to Reconstruct the History of Forest and Woodland Ecosystems, 9 - Palynology: An Important Tool for Discovering Historic Ecosystems, 10 - Packrat Middens as a Tool for Reconstructing Historic Ecosystems, II - Techniques for Discovering Historic Animal Assemblages, 12 - Geomorphology, Hydrology, and Soils, 13 - Inferring Vegetation History from Phytoliths, III - Synthesis, 14 - Using Historical Data in Ecological Restoration: A Case Study from Nantucket, 15 - A Multiple-Scale History of Past and Ongoing Vegetation Change within the Indiana Dunes, 16 - Implementing the Archaeo-environmental Reconstruction Technique:, 17 - Documenting Local Landscape Change, About the Contributors, Index, Island Press Board of Directors, CHAPTER 1 Archaeology, Paleoecosystems, and Ecological Restoration Michael J. O'Brien Archaeologists have long been interested in the role the physical environment played in structuring the activities of prehistoric human groups. More recently, research has begun to shift toward the role of humans as active participants in paleoecosystems. This move toward paleoecology has not signaled an abandonment of traditional research questions having to do with humans and their environment—why groups lived in certain locales and not others; why they selected certain foods over others; and why they chose particular raw materials for their clothing, tools, and weapons. It has, however, signaled an end to the centuries-old belief in environmental determinism. Despite this trend, paleoecological research is still an undercurrent in terms of actual archaeological practice. Although modern archaeologists are more familiar with paleoecology than their predecessors were, today's "ecologically oriented" archaeological applications are often based on methods more than on anything else. With a few exceptions—for example, the earlier work of Kent Flannery (1968) on systems theory and, later, the work of human evolutionary ecologists (Bettinger 1991; Kelly 1995)—theoretical work on such topics as grain response (MacArthur and Pianka 1966; Pianka 1974), patchiness (Wiens 1976), and central-place foraging (Orians and Pearson 1979) have not had the kind of impact in archaeology that one might have hoped. One reason archaeologists fail to connect their studies of paleoenvironments to paleoecology is because of the difficulty inherent in reconstructing historic settings. Archaeologists ar