Comparison of Vegetation on Grazed and ungrazed Pinyon-Juniper Grassland in New Mexico

Abstract

A study to compare vegetation on three grazed areas with that on comparable areas, protected for 12 years, on the Fort Stanton Range revealed that both herbage production and height of blue grama plants were significantly higher on protected areas for all three sites. Species composition was not significantly different between grazed and protected areas on the stony hills site, but composition of mat muhly was significantly higher on grazed areas on both loamy bottomland and loamy upland sites. Composition of blue grama and western wheatgrass was significantly lower on the grazed area on the loamy bottomland site.