7. Recharging the Floridian aquifer
 8. Atmospheric gas exchange, and
 9. Nutrient cycling.

 These ecosystem values suggest the importance of wetlands construction and
 reclamation for the maintenance of environmental integrity throughout Florida (Best and
 others 1997). Determining the role of vines within developing forested wetland systems
 is important in these constructed systems. If vines are preventing forest development,
 then control measures should be implemented. However, if the occurrence of vines
 benefits successional development than control measures would delay forest
 development.

 Other important topics pertaining to the processes involved in wetland
 construction include reclamation and restoration, pertinent legislation, and phosphate
 mining. A brief literature review of these topics is available in Appendix A.


 Systems Modeling

 Models are useful tools to identify patterns in system development. Systems
 modeling has a long history of computer simulations showing succession. Burs (1970)
 and Regan (1977) each created successional models at the ecosystem scale. These
 models showed the automatic transfer of energy from developing the short-term rapidly
 charging feedback loop first (such as pioneer species and herbaceous vines) to the longer
 time cycle that develops structure more slowly (such as vegetation developing structure).
 These shifts in energy were based on the distribution of time constraints, so that as time
 increased the ecosystem matured. This is important because time is a large constraint
 when releasing sites in the central Florida phosphate district. Models by Noon (1996),
 Bersok (1986), and Gutierrez and Fey (1980) and have also focused on succession.

 Jackson (1999) developed a model based on the interactions within forested
wetland succession after phosphate mining in central Florida. It looked specifically at the
competition between pioneer and late successional species. Results of the simulation
suggested that pioneer species are important for development of late successional
ecosystems, and that without such pioneer species climax stages may be delayed by as
much as 50 years.

 Ecosystems develop complex, dynamic patterns in time and space (Richardson
1988). Throughout the literature, there are many computer simulation models that
consider the organizational processes and long-term successional changes facing
ecosystems. These models are often calibrated with field data in order to reflect real
ecosystems. Odum (1994) suggests that succession can be measured by growth curves of
the main parameters of the ecosystem, including but not limited to live biomass, nutrient
storage, total organic matter storage, diversity, web parameters, total metabolism, and
total energy receptor quantities. As succession progresses, there is typically a growth of


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