A grazing trial in Central Otago compared the effectiveness of feral goats, Angora goats and Merino sheep for sweet brier control. The three ammal types were set stocked in replicate 0.5 ha paddocks at 10 Angoras, 14 ferals and 12 Merinos per ha. Goats were also rotationally grazed on a 50 ha block at approximately 10 goats per ha. Goat grazing reduced living brie, in the trial paddocks to negl...

 Phytoplankton growth and microzooplankton grazing were investigated at one station in the Homa Lagoon from February to January in 2006-2007. Our results showed significant seasonal variations in phytoplankton dynamics. Microzooplankton was mainly composed of dinoflagellates and tintinnid ciliates and nauplii. Microzooplankton grazing increased with increasing of temperature. Grazing rate was ma...

The present study aimed to evaluate the effects of agroforestry system on the feeding behavior of dairy cows in the Brazilian Amazon region. Nineteen cross breed dairy cows (14.0±3.30 kg/d of milk yield and 450±40.1 kg body weight) were used. The following treatments were evaluated: A) animals were maintained in opened pasture of Brachiaria brizantha during all the day; B) animals were...

Soil degradation caused by overgrazing is a worldwide problem. The degradation of an overutilized area occurs mainly where animals prefer to spend extra time because of the attractants that are around gateways, water sources, along fences or farm buildings. High grazing pressure decreases plant density which results in changes of the botanical composition of a pasture. The effect that grazing h...

Fermentation in the rumen of cattle produces methane (CH4). Methane may play a role in global warming scenarios. The linking of grazing management strategies to more efficient beef production while reducing the CH4 emitted by beef cattle is important. The sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) tracer technique was used to determine the effects of best management practices (BMP) grazing compared with continu...

Intensification of fires and grazing by large herbivores has caused population declines in small vertebrates in many ecosystems worldwide. Impacts are rarely direct, and usually appear driven via indirect pathways, such as changes to predator-prey dynamics. Fire events and grazing may improve habitat and/or hunting success for the predators of small mammals, however, such impacts have not been ...

Predation of attached Pseudomonas putida mt2 by the small ciliate Tetrahymena sp. was investigated with a percolated column system. Grazing rates were examined under static and dynamic conditions and were compared to grazing rates in batch systems containing suspended prey. The prey densities were 2 x 10(8) bacteria per ml of pore space and 2 x 10(8) bacteria per ml of suspension, respectively....

Chaparral lands of central Arizona are important for water production. They are also used as grazing lands for livestock and as habitat for wildlife. An understanding of the relation of grazing to runoff and erosion is thus essential to the development of management systems for sustained high yields. This paper reports the effects of grazing on runoff and erosion as determined on four experimen...

In grazing systems, heterogeneous distributions of forage resources and faeces result in localised accumulations of nutrients and parasites (both macroparasites and microparasites), creating trade-offs between the costs of exposure to infestation or infection and the benefits of nutrient intake. Each contact between livestock and faeces in the environment is a potential parasite/pathogen transm...