At the core of ecosystem management is the desire to restore and sustain forests. Fully functioning and sustainable ecosystems produce an array of benefits that include clean water, habitat for wildlife, while serving as an important source of both commodity and non-commodity wealth to the public. Ecosystem restoration, as a part of ecosystem management plays an important part in the agency's achieving its mission of land stewardship and meeting public needs.

Ecosystem restoration generally leads to a desired condition identified as one similar to the "pre-settlement'' condition. The reason for choosing this idealized baseline condition is rooted in the ecological concept as articulated by to Aldo Leopold's vision of "keeping all the pieces together''. The logic of this concept flows out of the belief that, in the past, prior to European settlement, ecosystems sustained themselves with natural disturbance as the driving force bringing about change in forest composition and structure. This natural disturbance may have included aboriginal activities. The disturbance mechanisms, while sometimes catastrophic, (and as often not), did not dramatically effect the overall range of forest conditions over larger landscapes for longer periods of time. While quite dynamic and variable, forests remained ecologically stable, resilient and resistant. It is this theorized ideal that leads to the hope that restoring a forest to some more "original'' composition and structure will also restore some degree of "function’’ and produce more ecologically sustainable conditions.

Assessments of past, present and future forest composition; structure and function are critical keys in identifying what ecosystems have restoration needs. The desire to restore an ecosystem is problematic however. Some restoration is simply impossible due to the complete or "near'' extirpation of a keystone species (e.g. passenger pigeons, woods bison, elk or beaver) or the accidental introduction of an exotic pest (e.g. chestnut blight, kudzu, hemlock wooly adelgid, etc.). Conflicts also arise when a reintroduction has the potential to produce a social or economic threat (e.g. red wolf and eastern cougar reintroductions).