Glossary

Acquisition	The purchasing of a piece of land for the protection or restoration of plants and animals. Commonly called fee simple acquisition by real estate and land trust practitioners, it is the result of purchasing all rights an existing owner may have to the land, including that of "quiet enjoyment" in perpetuity. Compare easement.
Anadromous	An organism that migrates from the sea to freshwater for reproduction.
Anthropogenic	Caused or produced by human action.
Bankfull width	Channel width between the tops of banks on either side of a stream; tops of banks are the points at which water overflows its channel at bankfull discharge. Contrast wetted width.
Baseline monitoring	Characterizing existing biota, chemical or physical conditions for planning or future comparisons. Compare status, trend, implementation, effectiveness, and validation monitoring.
Basin	See watershed.
Benthic	Of, related to, or living in the soil-water interface of a lake or stream.
Biofilm	Community of microorganisms attached to a solid surface.
Biotic integrity	The capability of supporting and maintaining a balanced, integrated, adaptive community of organisms having a species composition, diversity, and functional organization comparable to that of the natural habitat of the regions.
Biomass	Total amount of all living organisms in a biological community, as in a unit area or weight or volume of habitat.
Biota	Flora and fauna of a region.
Brush bundles	Groups of trees and branches placed into a lake or stream to create habitat and cover for fish. Often used in conjunction with other habitat rehabilitation techniques.
Brush park	Submerged or partially submerged structures made of brush, branches, and aquatic vegetation secured in place with poles or fences. They are designed to provide fish rearing areas, fishing opportunity, or a refuge for fish. They vary in size from a few square meters to several hectares and are placed in lakes, streams, and brackish waters.
Catchment	See watershed.
Channelization	Straightening, narrowing, and deepening of a stream channel to improve navigation, move water faster, prevent flooding of human infrastructure, provide for construction of infrastructure, or other human uses. Often includes removal of debris and channel obstructions that may impede flow conveyance.
Channel unit	See habitat unit.
Coarse sediment	Generally, greater than 2-mm diameter, which is gravel, cobbles, or boulders. Compare fine sediment.
Control site	A study location nearly identical to the treated location, with the exception that no treatment occurs. See also reference site.
Coppicing	Forest regeneration from vegetative sprouts from stumps, branches, or roots.
Creation (habitat)	Construction of a new habitat or ecosystem where it did not previously exist. This is often part of mitigation activities.
Culvert	A transverse pipe or totally enclosed drain under a road or railway. Typically used to convey stream flow under a road or other manmade construction.
Deflector	One of many types of wood or stone structures placed perpendicular or at angle to a stream bank to deflect flow and create a pool and improve fish habitat or prevent a bank from eroding.
Easement	In restoration ecology, it refers to acquiring a portion of the rights to a land to allow for, or protect from, a specific use. Technically defined as the nonpossessory interest granted in the lands of another, established to obtain certain limited rights (e.g., development rights, but never the right to "quiet enjoyment") that are often in perpetuity but sometimes for only set periods of time. Compare acquisition.
Ecosystem	Dynamic and holistic system of all the living and dead organisms in an area and the physical and climatic features that are interrelated in the transfer of energy and material.
Effectiveness monitoring	Evaluating whether actions had the desired effects on physical processes, habitat, or biota. Compare baseline, status, trend, implementation, and validation monitoring.
Endangered species	Species in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range. See also threatened species.
Enhancement	To improve the quality of a habitat through direct manipulation. It does not necessarily seek to restore processes or conditions to some predisturbed state. Some practitioners call this partial restoration. Compare rehabilitation and restoration.
Exclosure	Fencing an area to prevent (exclude) access of livestock or other ungulates.
Fine sediment	Generally, less than 2-mm diameter, typically composed of clay, silt, or sand. Compare coarse sediment.
Floodplain	A flat depositional feature of a river valley adjoining the channel, formed under present climate and hydrological conditions, and subject to periodic flooding.
Fry	Brief transitional stage of recently hatched fish that spans from absorption of the yolk sac through several weeks of independent feeding.
Gabion	Wire rectangular or round basket placed in a stream channel and filled with gravel, gobbles, boulders or other hard material to serve as bank protection or to create a weir to trap gravel, create a pool, and improve fish habitat.
Girdling	Removing the layer of bark and cambium around the circumference of a tree, usually performed in an attempt to kill the tree.
GIS (geographic information system)	A computer system for assembling, storing, manipulating, and displaying geographically referenced information.
Groin	A jetty extending from the bank into the channel designed to protect or stabilize a bank or trap gravel and sediment sands.
Gullying	Erosion of soil by formation or extension of channels (gullies) from surface runoff.
Habitat	In this report, the term refers to the aquatic environment that fish experience and not those landscape processes or attributes outside streams that alter habitat conditions.
Habitat unit	Distinct geomorphically defined area within a stream reach, such as a pool, a riffle, a glide, etc. Sometimes called a mesohabitat.
Hyporheic zone	The saturated interstitial areas below the streambed and into the streambanks (or floodplain), where stream water and deep groundwater intermix and where a number of important chemical, hydrological, and biological processes take place.
Implementation monitoring	Evaluating whether the restoration project was constructed (implemented) as planned. Compare baseline, status, trend, effectiveness, and validation monitoring.
Large woody debris (LWD)	Large piece of woody material such as a log or stump that intrudes into or lies entirely within a stream channel; LWD typically is defined as wood greater than 10 cm in diameter and 1 m in length, but other minimum size criteria also are used.
Levee	An embankment or dike constructed of earth, rock or other material to prevent a river from overflowing.
Limiting factor	Factor that confines (limits) the growth of an ecosystem element.
Long profile(longitudinal profile)	Longitudinal plot of elevation versus distance (gradient), typically along the thalweg of a stream.
Macroinvertebrate	Animal without a backbone, living one stage of its life cycle, usually the nymph or larval stage. Macroinvertebrates are visible without magnification, and many are benthic organisms (see benthic).
Main stem	Principle stream or channel of a stream network.
Mass wasting	Downslope movement of earth materials under gravity, including such processes as rockfalls, landslides, and debris flows.
Metapopulation	Network of semi-isolated populations, with some level of regular or intermittent migration and gene flow among them, in which individual populations may go extinct but then the habitat they occupied can become recolonized from remaining populations.
Metric	Standard of measurement or combination of parameters used as a standard of measurement. See also parameter and variable.
Mitigation	Action taken to alleviate or compensate for potentially adverse effects on an aquatic habitat that has been modified or lost by human activity.
Monitoring	Systematically checking or scrutinizing something for the purpose of collecting specific categories of data, especially on a recurring basis. In ecology, it generally refers to systematically sampling something in an effort to detect or evaluate a change or lack of change in a physical, a chemical, or a biological parameter. Compare baseline, status, trend, implementation, effectiveness, and validation monitoring.
N	Nitrogen
Nutrient enrichment	Addition of organic or inorganic compounds to a water body to increase background levels of nutrients (e.g., phosphorous, nitrogen).
Overstory	Uppermost layer of foliage that forms a forest canopy. Compare understory.
P	Phosphorus
Parameter	Quantitative physical, chemical, or biological property, such as water temperature or biota abundance, whose values describe the characteristics or behavior of an individual, a population, a community, or a ecosystem. See also metric and variable.
Parr	Young salmon during its freshwater residence between the fry and smolt stage and before the first seaward migration.
Periphyton	Sessile organisms, such as algae, that live attached to surfaces or rocks and other material projecting from the bottom of a freshwater aquatic environment.
Population	Group of individuals of a species living in a certain area that maintain some degree of reproductive isolation.
Power (statistical)	Probability of rejecting null hypothesis when it is, in fact, false and should be rejected. Typically denoted as alpha.
Primary production	Creation of organic matter (biomass) by photosynthesis or chemosynthesis.
Primary productivity	Rate at which organic matter (biomass) produced by photosynthesis or chemosynthesis is stored in an ecological community or group of communities. Compare secondary productivity.
Pseudoreplication	Use of inferential statistics to test for treatment effects with data from experiments, where either treatments are not replicated (though samples may be) or replicates are not statistically independent (S. H. Hurlbert, 1984, Pseudoreplication and the design of ecological field experiments, Ecological Monographs 54(2)187-211).
Reach	A geomorphically similar stream section or a section of stream as defined by two selected points.
Redd	Nest in gravel, dug by a fish for egg deposition, and associated gravel mounds.
Reference site	Site in a relatively natural state, representative of conditions before human disturbance. See also control.
Reclamation	Returning an area to its previous habitat type but not necessarily fully restore all functions.
Redd	A spawning nest constructed in the substrate of a lake or stream by a fish.
Rehabilitation	To restore or improve some aspects or an ecosystem but not fully restore all components. A general restoration term that can include habitat improvement, enhancement, or reclamation. Some practitioners call this partial restoration. Compare enhancement and restoration.
Remote sensing	Gathering data from a remote station or platform, as in satellite or aerial photography.
Restoration	1. Returning the ecosystem to some predisturbed condition. Some practitioners call this full restoration. 2. A general term for referring to various enhancement, improvement, and rehabilitation actions. Compare enhancement and rehabilitation.
Riffle	Shallow section of a river or stream, with moderate to rapid flow and with surface turbulence.
Riparian	The banks of a river or the terrestrial aquatic interface. That part of the terrestrial landscape that exerts a direct influence on stream channels or lake margins, and the water or aquatic ecosystems.
Riprap	Layer of large, durable materials such as rock used to protect a streambank from erosion; also may refer to the materials used, such as rocks or broken concrete.
Rubble matt	The placement of rocks, boulders, or concrete into the stream channel to create diverse flow and velocities and create riffles or fast water habitats for fishes and other aquatic organisms.
Salmonid	Fish of the family Salmonidae, including salmon, trout, and chars.
Samrah	See brush park.
Secondary productivity	Rate at which primary (plant and organism) material is synthesized into animal tissue per unit area in a given time period. Compare primary productivity.
Sediment supply	Supply of sediment to a river system, where it is carried in suspension (see suspended load and wash load) or on the bottom (see bed load).
Sheetwash	Surface erosion from water running off in sheets, distinct from channelized erosion in rills and gullies.
Side channel	A subsidiary or overflow channel branching from the primary stream channel, typically conveying a small fraction of the total stream flow.
Sill	A low weir partially buried in the stream bottom designed to aggrade or maintain the channel level and improve fish habitat.
Silviculture	In forestry or forest management, the care, cultivation, and harvest of trees. In restoration ecology, the term generally refers to planting, removing, or growing trees and other vegetation to restore certain forest characteristics.
Site	Place where a treatment or restoration activity may occur. Term can indicate a habitat unit or stream reach, depending on the coverage of the treatment or restoration activity.
Smolt	A young salmon just after the parr stage that has undergone the physiological changes to prepare it for its first migration from freshwater to the sea. A juvenile salmon in its seaward migration stage.
Snorkeling	A method for enumerating fish and aquatic organisms commonly used in clear lakes and streams that involved underwater visual observation using a mask and snorkel and other occasionally other diving equipment.
Soil creep	Gradual downslope movement of the soil mantle.
Staking and layering (riparian planting)	A form of riparian replanting that involves both the vertical placement of live shoots or cuttings and the horizontal placement of larger cuttings or branches. Commonly used for establishing willows to stabilizing banks and soils.
Status monitoring	Characterizing the condition (spatial variability) of physical or biological attributes across a given area. Compare baseline, trend, implementation, effectiveness, and validation monitoring.
Swale	A shallow troughlike depression that transports or retains water primarily during rainstorms or snow melts. They can either be natural topographic features or constructed depressions designed to retain water and prevent flooding.
Thinning	Removal of trees or other vegetation to allow for increased growth of other trees or vegetation.
Trend monitoring	Monitoring changes in biota or physical conditions over time. Compare baseline, status, implementation, effectiveness, and validation monitoring.
Understory	Shrubs and smaller trees between the ground cover and the forest canopy. Compare overstory.
Ungulate	Any of a number of hoofed, typically herbivorous, quadruped mammals, superficially similar but not necessarily closely related taxonomically.
Validation monitoring	Evaluating whether the hypothesized cause-and-effect relationship between restoration action or other treatment, and physical and biological response were correct. Sometimes considered a part of effectiveness monitoring. Compare baseline, status, trend, implementation, and effectiveness monitoring.
Water bar	Construction of small (generally less than 50cm) mound of soil and associated ditch across dirt or gravel roads to transport water across the road onto forest floor or adjacent hill slope. They are typically constructed on roads in mountainous areas to prevent water from running down the road surface and cause erosion.
Watershed	Entire land-drainage area of a river. Also called basin, drainage basin, or catchment.
Weir	1. A low dam constructed in a stream to divert or retain water for various human uses. 2. A low dam or obstruction constructed of logs or rocks placed across a stream to create a pool or trap gravel and improve fish habitat.
Wetted width	Width of the water surface within a channel. Contrast bankfull width.