RSS 1.0Rangelands, Volume 41 (2019)
ABOUT THE COLLECTIONS
Welcome to the Rangelands archives. The archives provide public access, in a "rolling window" agreement with the Society for Range Management, to Rangelands (1979-present) from v.1 up to two years from the present year.
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ISSN: 0190-0528
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Are Landowners, Managers, and Range Management Academics on the Same Page About Conservation?Conservation of California rangelands hinges on partnerships among ranchers, agency and nongovernmental organization managers, and academics. A “sustainable use” perspective on conservation was predominate among ranchers, whereas a more preservation-oriented perspective was common among managers; the perspective of academics was in between the two. Conservation priorities among ranchers and managers largely overlapped, except that ranchers prioritized livestock production and ranch succession, and managers prioritized habitat protection. Land use change was a shared concern among the three groups. Opportunities for rangeland conservation included improving communication among diverse stakeholders and applying recent scientific developments to on-the-ground range management.
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Hold Your Ground: Threats to Soil Function in Northern Great Plains Grazing LandsMany soils throughout the northern Great Plains (NGP) of North America possess attributes that support the successful delivery of multiple ecosystem services from grazing lands. Anticipated changes in climate and land use in the region, however, suggest delivery of these services could be compromised in the future because of an increase in threats to soil function. These threats include soil organic matter decline, reduced physical stability, soil erosion, compaction, localized nutrient accumulation, acidification, and salinization. Adaptive management to conserve existing soil functions in grazing lands is necessary and includes: 1) judicious management of forage resources, 2) strategic application of management to modify vegetation composition or soil conditions, and 3) use of restoration and conservation practices known to maintain vegetation cover and protect soil. Management approaches to conserve soil functions in NGP grazing lands will likely require considerable adaptive capacity by land managers. Successful application of management will require timely information about soil and vegetation conditions to guide land-use decisions.
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A Tool for Projecting Rangeland Vegetation Response to Management and ClimateNew technologies may enhance management by enabling quantitative testing of assumptions of vegetation response to climate and management. State-and-transition simulation models can keep track of interactions that are too complicated for us to comprehend using only conceptual models. This tool takes conceptual state-and-transition models to the next level, fostering greater communication and dialogue with stakeholders. Based on the models and climate data used here, increased drought may enhance transitions between vegetative states. It is important to be as explicit and quantitative as possible as to how you expect vegetation states or ecosystem processes to transition between one another.
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Challenges Facing Grasslands inthe Northern Great Plains and North Central RegionGrasslands in the Northern Great Plains and North Central Region are diverse, highly productive, and remarkably resilient. Despite these advantages, these grasslands are being threatened by land use change, invasive species, and loss of biodiversity, as well as being presented with new challenges in how to manage for threatened and endangered species. Between 2008 and 2012, approximately 2.3 million hectares of grasslands were converted to crop production, while on the remaining grasslands, invasions of perennial cool-season grasses have altered the forage cycle, reduced diversity, and negatively impacted pollinator habitat. However, the high forage quality and productivity of the grasslands in the area suggest that there are opportunities to address these challenges. Maintaining ranchers on the landscape to keep grasslands intact is a critical component in realizing these opportunities; therefore, efforts to maintain grasslands in the region need to focus on producer profitability.
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History of Grass Breeding for Grazing Lands in the Northern Great Plains of the USA and CanadaIn the early 1930s there were millions of acres of extensively degraded grazing lands and abandoned and eroded cropland in the Northern Plains of the United States and Canada. Grass breeding and plant materials programs were established by both the US and Canadian governments and cooperating universities to develop revegetation materials. Efforts of a small number of research locations and people resulted in grass cultivars or varieties that were used to revegetate and preserve the soil on millions of acres of land. This is a brief history of the people, agencies, and universities that developed these cultivars that restored and increased the productivity of grasslands in the Northern Plains.
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Ecosystem Services Provided by Prairie Wetlands in Northern RangelandsWetlands add significant ecosystem services to rangeland. These services include: sediment capture; groundwater recharge and discharge; stock water processing and purification; habitat and forage for plants and animals, including livestock; and climate protection via carbon storage. Services from wetlands occur at multiple scales, from local to global. These services are lost when wetlands are permanently drained. Strategic management of wetlands in rangeland can sustain most services, diversify and improve ranch income, lower the costs of livestock production, and provide benefits to society beyond the ranch boundary.
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Evolving Management Paradigms on U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Lands in the Prairie Pothole RegionThe US Fish and Wildlife Service manages nearly 1 million acres of wetlands and grasslands in the Prairie Pothole Region. Initial management paradigms focused on nesting cover for waterfowl and other birds, which led to idling prairies, and seeding former croplands to non-native plants. Current paradigms encompass a broader focus on ecological integrity and biological diversity, resulting in increased defoliation of prairies and seeding former croplands to native plants.
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Overview of the Historic and Current Vegetation Near the 100th Meridian in North Central United StatesThe Northern Great Plains contains a diverse group of vegetative communities, primarily dominated by grassland communities. Precipitation declines along an east-west gradient, ranging from 27.4 inches at Detroit Lakes, Minnesota to 12.4 inches at Miles City, Montana, and productivity follows a similar decline. Precipitation falls primarily during the growing season, which combined with the lower mean annual temperature results in productive, high-quality, cool-season dominated grasslands. Although the region is primarily dominated by areas of tallgrass, midgrass, and shortgrass prairie, there are outcrops of limber (Pinus flexilis) and ponderosa pine (P. ponderosa) along the Little Missouri River and stands of quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) in the Turtle Mountains. Besides climate and soils, fire, drought, and grazing have also contributed to the rich diversity of communities in the region. Recent invasions of perennial cool-season grasses are threatening historic plant communities; whether these invasions can be reversed and altered environmental services restored are the primary questions facing grassland managers.
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Upland Water and Deferred Rotation Effects on Cattle Use in Riparian and Upland Areas – A Reply to Carter et al. 2017A recent publication by Carter et al. (2017) presents research on the effects of deferred rotation grazing and water provisioning on a suite of environmental variables. We detail issues that call into question the validity of the results and conclusions reported by the authors. Data were not collected in a scientifically rigorous way. Sufficient detail is not presented for the study to be replicated. The authors do not adhere to standard statistical definitions or assumptions. The study suffers from unaccounted for pseudoreplication. The authors draw conclusions beyond the reasonable scope of inference.
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Rangelands Table of Contents Volume 41, Number 1 (2019)Society for Range Management, 2019-02
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Linking Landscapes and People —Projecting the Future of the Great PlainsWe developed a unique set of landscape projections for the Great Plains that use real land-management parcels to represent landscape patterns at high spatial and thematic resolution. Both anthropogenic land use and natural vegetation respond in the model to projected changes in groundwater availability and climate change. Thirty-three scenario combinations were modeled, facilitating landscape planning and mitigation efforts under a range of possible landscape futures. Change in rangeland from 2014 to 2100 varied from an increase of 4.3% for the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) B2 scenario, to a decline of 23.6% for the SRES A1B scenario. The spatially and thematically detailed projections are designed for the assessment of landscape interactions with water flow and water quality, species distribution and abundance modeling, greenhouse gas assessments, and other ecosystem services.
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Contemporary Livestock–Predator Themes Identified Through a Wyoming, USA Rancher SurveyLivestock-predator interactions structure ranchers' perceptions of predators. We surveyed 274 ranchers in Wyoming using open-answer questions about contemporary livestock-predator themes. Four themes emerged: 1) difficulty mitigating losses from protected large carnivores; 2) escalating impacts of predatory birds on livestock and wildlife; 3) sustainability of predator management funding; and 4) continual bureaucratic complexities of predator management. Themes had an underlying thread regarding the tension between state control versus federal control including concern about growing predator populations that may affect both livestock and native wildlife such as greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus).
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The Prehistoric Bison of Yellowstone National ParkWhen Yellowstone National Park (YNP) was established in 1872, American bison (Bison bison) were living in the park's forests and mountains. A study conducted in the 1960s concluded that those were Mountain bison (Bison bison athabascae), a subspecies adapted to mountain habitat. It was assumed that those historical bison occupied their native habitat and had done so in prehistoric times. When archaeological evidence of YNP bison was discovered in the mid-1990s it seemed reasonable to assume that those bones were derived from a herd of native prehistoric bison. However, a review of archaeological, historical, genetic, and ecological evidence suggests a different history. Namely, herds of bison were absent before 1840. Sometime between 1840 and the mid-1850s, plains bison were driven into the mountain forest in and near YNP. In those forests, bison were relatively safe from horse-mounted, bow-and-arrow-armed Native American hunters. Archaeological evidence suggests that YNP's prehistoric bison were bulls that left herds on the low-elevation plains that surround the park; the bulls would have traveled up mountain drainages to the Yellowstone volcanic plateau. Bison played no significant role in the ecological processes that shaped YNP's prehistoric landscape. YNP's modern bison herd is causing significant changes in range condition.
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Survivability of Wyoming Big Sagebrush TransplantsWyoming big sagebrush is a dominant shrub species on millions of acres of rangelands throughout the Intermountain West and plays a critical role in the health and diversity of many wildlife species. Restoration practices to re-establish Wyoming big sagebrush on degraded habitats have largely been met with submarginal success, yet the need to restore or rehabilitate Wyoming big sagebrush has become increasingly important due to extensive losses of big sagebrush habitats, fragmentation, and sensitive sagebrush obligate species. Lack of success from seeding rangelands either by ground application or aerially has prompted some resource managers to look more closely at transplantng methodologies. Transplanting of Wyoming big sagebrush is largely done using cone-size containers or bare-stock plants and is recommended to be conducted in spring. This study was initiated in 2012 to test fall versus spring transplanting. Fall transplanting success averaged 65% with a range of 41% to 82%, while spring transplant success averaged 41% with a range of 13% to 65%. The cold desert of the Great Basin receives the majority of its precipitation during winter months, therefore providing a more reliable source of available precipitation for newly transplanted Wyoming big sagebrush seedlings. A significant part of increasing big sagebrush transplanting success is the combination of increased container size and moving the timing of transplanting from spring to fall due to an increase in favorable and reliable precipitation.
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Rangelands Table of Contents Volume 41, Number 2 (2019)Society for Range Management, 2019-04
