OCTOBER 2017 SEEDWORLD.COM / 17 Concerned about the habitat and state of the creek on his land, the landowner sought advice from engineers and envi- ronmental designers. Nordfors was the one who landed the job. “We are not interested in restoration, but rehabilitation,” Nordfors says. “For the most successful types of rehab, our goal is to repair the primary process for a successful and resilient landscape in the future — one that maintains previous levels of biodiversity, is self-perpetuating and helps stabilize the system as a whole.” In pulling together the design plans, Nordfors takes a number of factors into account including energy capture, hydro- logical functions and nutrient cycling. He also considers biodiversity (terrestrial and aquatic) of the habitat. Some of the ques- tions he asks are: •  How can we start the flywheel of nutrient cycling again? •  Is there enough nitrogen in the soils? Or is there too much? • What caused the disturbance, and how can we ? •  Is rain being captured or is it running off? • How deep is the water percolating? •  How does the site fit into the larger topography? Nordfors says the forests comprising this region of the Appalachian Mountains are in a state of chronic decline due to acid rain, which causes calcium to leach from the soils. That calcium is needed for the trees to produce lignin, which is responsible for making the trunks sturdy and the leaf cuticles strong and durable. With less lignin being produced, it’s much easier for microorganisms to degrade the leaf litter, so there’s more bare soil, says Nordfors, who resides in Noxen, Penn. “There’s almost three times as much nitrogen in the soil from decades of acid rain events, which changes it from a fun- gal-dominated soil that acts like a thick web matrix to a bacterial-dominated soil that acts more like greased marbles,” he explains. “In short, this means the soils are less resistant to erosion and more prone to mass wasting.” Nordfors says his goal with this project was to protect the farmland and improve the ecological function of the creek, which had a 14-foot elevation change, on the landowner’s property. This meant building a structure that could withstand a flood of that nature again, plus some- thing more. As part of the rehabilitation design, the bank return had to be dug out.