Abstract
Institutional greenspaces such as golf courses, cemeteries, military bases, hospitals, and university campuses are not generally revered for their ecological integrity. The existence of golf courses in particular has been heavily debated due to widespread perceptions of these spaces as environmentally degrading. Though much of the total area of golf courses is occupied by heavily manicured lawns, Canadian golf courses tend to be well treed and thus show significant potential to enhance forest coverage and contribute to the conservation of native tree species when established on previously unforested land. To explore this potential, a tree inventory was carried out on an inner-city golf course in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and findings compared to an earlier inventory of more naturalized (i.e., ingrowth) forest areas in the same city. Based in the Acadian Forest Region, this case study used the characteristics of a healthy and mature Acadian Forest as a model for ecological integrity. It was found that both the golf course and the ingrowth populations were largely representative of a mixedwood Acadian forest. Likewise, both populations were in a similar stage of regeneration and exhibited similar stresses. These results suggest that if improved forest management approaches are employed, golf courses will effectively strengthen the ecological integrity of urban forests. This is an especially important finding in the climate change era when tree populations are likely to be subjected to new environmental stressors which may be alleviated via the human intervention that is available on managed lands such as institutional greenspaces.
Highlights
In an increasingly urbanizing world, it seems reasonable to question whether urban forests can be characterized as functionally healthy ecosystems
While the ecosystem services provided by street trees, such as rainwater filtration, storm-water management, carbon capture, and amelioration of the urban-heat-island effect [4] have been well documented, it is less clear how trees growing on institutional greenspaces—which in this context is defined as mixed-use, managed greenspaces that exist for purposes other than conservation, such as golf courses, cemeteries, military bases, hospitals, university campuses, etc.—might contribute to the health and vitality of urban ecosystems
“golfscape” and the larger urban ecosystem, this study focused exclusively on golf course trees
Summary
In an increasingly urbanizing world, it seems reasonable to question whether urban forests can be characterized as functionally healthy ecosystems. Forests 2020, 11, x FOR PEER REVIEW such landscapes, golf courses especially, are often condemned as being environmentally degraded, vitality of urban ecosystems Rather, such landscapes, and are rarely perceived as ecologically valuable spacesgolf [5]. The characteristics of a healthy, mature, multi-successional Acadian forest, as described by Rowe in 1972 [12] and Loo and Ives in 2003 [13], have been used to model ecological integrity for the purposes of this study Both the forest patches on the golf course and more-naturalized patches found elsewhere in the HRM were measured against this model based on species composition, tree condition, and age-class to determine whether patches growing on managed landscapes were in better, worse, or similar condition to those growing in areas with no human intervention. It endeavors to fill a gap in the existing literature investigating the role of trees in enhancing ecological integrity of golf courses in the Canadian context
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