Applied nucleation (i.e. planting vegetation patches) is a restoration strategy that better recreates natural ecosystem heterogeneity and requires fewer resources compared to planting the entire area. Whereas applied nucleation shows promise as a forest restoration strategy, this approach has received little study in grassland restoration, where the spread of planted vegetation nuclei may be impeded by aggressive non‐native species. We compared the establishment and cover of restored native grass, forb, and rush species for 7 years in applied nucleation and full planting treatments in a former agricultural site dominated by non‐natives along the central California coast. We planted seedlings of the same nine coastal prairie species in all treatments, but the applied nucleation plots had four nuclei with only 30% of the seedlings as the full planting plots. We also evaluated the effect of adding wood mulch to reduce non‐native plant competition. Native forb cover increased over time and was similar across treatments in the final study year. Native grasses increased for the first 4 years and then declined sharply in all treatments. Native forb cover spread into unplanted areas in applied nucleation plots, whereas grasses showed minimal spread. Of the five planted forb species, the two that persisted until the final study year both spread via rhizomes. Wood mulch reduced non‐native cover in the first 2 years and had a longer‐term effect on species composition. Our results suggest that applied nucleation can be an effective restoration strategy at a small scale in non‐native‐dominated grasslands for species that spread vegetatively.

中文翻译：

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营养扩散是非本地化草原成功进行成核的关键

应用成核（即种植植被斑块）是一种恢复策略，与种植整个区域相比，该策略可以更好地重现自然生态系统的异质性，并且所需资源更少。尽管应用成核技术有望将其作为森林恢复策略，但是这种方法在草地恢复方面却鲜有研究，在该种草地上，侵入性非本地物种可能阻碍了人工种植的植物核的扩散。我们比较了在加州中部沿海地区原住民占主导地位的一个以前的农业场地中，经过应用成核和完整种植处理，恢复了7年的天然草皮，草皮和草皮物种的建立和覆盖。在所有处理中，我们都种植了相同的9种沿海大草原树种的幼苗，但是所应用的成核区只有四个核，而只有30％的幼苗是完整的种植区。我们还评估了添加木料覆盖物以减少非本地植物竞争的效果。随着时间的流逝，原生的前肢覆盖物增加，并且在最后一个研究年度中，各治疗之间的相似性。在最初的四年中，原生草增加了，然后在所有处理中急剧下降。在所应用的成核区中，原生的草覆盖物扩散到未种植的区域，而草显示出最小的扩散。在五个种植的福布斯物种中，两个一直持续到最后一个研究年的物种都通过根茎传播。木材覆盖物在头两年减少了非原生植物的覆盖，并对物种组成产生了较长期的影响。