Conclusions
Current traditional best reclamation practices struggle to establish and sustain a native landscape due to challenges often associated with soil compaction and aggressive non-natives. Alleviating soil compaction due to surface mining often times takes place years to decades after reclamation had ceased and/or frequently emphasizes the establishment of woody plant communities. We investigated how combinations of alternative reclamation practices, applied during the process, affected native grassland species composition, and influenced KBG establishment. Generally, our findings indicate when G/F seed mixtures are combined with TSR (plus mulch) intentionally planted native species will be well represented and PR resistance will be lower compared to other combinations of reclamation practices. Those treatments planted to G and reclaimed with SSR (plus mulch) had higher PR at all depths and were not as strongly associated with planted native species, but these treatments had less KBG cover compared to other reclamation combinations.
These findings provide valuable insight into early stages of ecological recovery for reclaimed grasslands as a function of these alternative reclamation practices. However, it is important to note that PR values for the reference site (i.e., standard practices), at all three depths, were not different from any of the alternative reclamation practices. Yet, ecological recovery of newly reclaimed landscapes takes time, and as time progresses some of the beneficial conditions created by our alternative practices could be enhanced or regress, changing the current trajectory. Therefore, continued monitoring of these difference reclamation combinations is important for understanding the effects soil properties have on reclaimed grasslands plant communities to determine if intermittent maintenance is necessary long-term.