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• ~$ • <br />neutralization and homogenization has not occurred to defeat the successional <br />phylogeny of the grassland plant communities. In other words, the dynamics <br />of community succession are adapted to begin and progress in an orderly <br />fashion from wherever the successional clock is restarted, including bare <br />mineral soil, but there may not be sufficient vegetational adaptability to <br />restart a successional clock that has been literally scrambled so that its <br />geochemical strata are mixed in a fashion for which the vegetation has never <br />had genetic experience. <br />A Question of Acceptance <br />Prospects for successful reclamation on the high plains can be debated for <br />decades with little real data to support the claims of those who say that <br />success is reasonably assured or those who say it will never occur. The <br />basic issue is one of acceptable standards for reclamation and adequate in- <br />formation upon which to base a mining plan and reclamation scheme. It is <br />apparent that no adequate analyses have been conducted upon which to base <br />a truly sound reclamation plan. Efforts to date are little more than ex- <br />periments in reclamation since the fundamental knowledge upon which to <br />judge potentials for success is not known. <br />If one is willing to accept conditional reclamation; that is, reclamation <br />that is defined as effective so long as man can step in and augment or <br />counteract natural forces, then reclamation is certainly possible but much <br />more needs to be learned to insure adequate efforts. }[owever, such con- <br />