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PREFACE xiii creative use of ecological information, believing that a good example is more instructive than a bad one. In following this strategy, we also recognized that powerful analytical systems are not substitutes for biological insights or imaginative questioning and hypothesizing. Therefore, we joined the Committee on Applications of Ecological Theory to Environmental Problems in focusing on some important issues concerning restoration techniques. This report does not address the need for reintroducing species in restoration attempts, except to note the need for source pools of spe- cies in each ecoregion. The 1981 National Research Council report Testing for Effects of Chemicals on Ecosystems3 advocated the establish- ment of ecological preserves, although for a different purpose (test species for ecotoxicological procedures including the establishment of microcosms and mesocosms). The need fox such ecological pre- serves as a source of recolonizing species will increase dramatically if the "no-net-loss" policy for wetlands and other aquatic ecosystems is not implemented expeditiously. The committee carried out its tasks through a series of meetings in which the format of the report was decided. Subgroups were formed to draft the various chapters. Restoration case studies were selected by these groups to illustrate points made in each chapter. The com- mittee made four field trips to sites where restoration of aquatic sys- tems had taken place or was going on. Subcommittees made two other site visits. An assignment of this complexity, especially in a newly develop- ing field, requires an exceptional effort on the part of committee members. The linkages among various components of the aquatic ecosystems and the terrestrial system that so strongly affects them are numerous and complex, as are the economic and policy questions related to the restoration process. Committee members worked diligently to sort through an enormous amount of information pertaining to a variety of aquatic ecosystems involving an even wider variety of methods to identify and analyze components critical to restoration efforts. I am much indebted to the subcommittee chairs Patrick Brezonik, Donald Hey, Leonard Shabman, Richard Sparks, James Tripp, Dan Willard, and Joy Zedler, who facilitated the flow of information and the meet- ing of deadlines. Most importantly, their summaries at each com- mittee meeting ensured that the entire committee was aware of the working of these subunits. 3National Research Council. 1981. Testing for Effects of Chemicals on Ecosystems. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.