Global food demand is growing rapidly. Livestock grazing can provide a valuable source of protein, but conventional grazing is often unsustainable. We studied an 800,000-ha section of a threatened ecoregion in southeastern Australia. Conventional management in the region involves continuous livestock grazing with few rest periods and regular fertilizer application. By using remotely sensed data...

BACKGROUND The effects of grazing on soil methane (CH4) uptake in steppe ecosystems are important for understanding carbon sequestration and cycling because the role of grassland soil for CH4 uptake can have major impacts at the global level. Here, a meta-analysis of 27 individual studies was carried out to assess the response patterns of soil CH4 uptake to grazing in steppe ecosystems of China...

Greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes and soil organic carbon (SOC) accumulation in grassland ecosystems are intimately linked to grazing management. This study assessed the carbon equivalent flux (Ceq) from 1) an irrigated, heavily stocked, low-density grazing system, 2) a nonirrigated, lightly stocked, high-density grazing system, and 3) a grazing-exclusion pasture site on the basis of the GHG emission...

one of the key factors in managing a rangeland is to determine the relative preference of its major plant species by thegrazing livestock. preference value of each plant species is affected by plant type, companion plants, availability byanimals, phenological stage, climate condition, and the livestock species. we investigated the grazing behaviour of anative goat (garizi) in the steppe rangela...

Question: Is the assumption of trait independence implied in Westoby’s (1998) leaf-height-seed (LHS) ecology strategy scheme upheld in a Mediterranean grazing system dominated by annuals? Is the LHS approach applicable at the community level? Location: Northern Israel. Methods: LHS traits (specific leaf area [SLA], plant height and seed mass), and additional leaf traits (leaf dry matter content...

A grazing study was undertaken to examine the effect of maintaining three levels of pre-grazing herbage mass (HM) on dairy cow performance, grass dry matter (DM) production and output from perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.) pastures. Cows were randomly assigned to one of three pre-grazing HM treatments: 1150 - Low HM (L), 1400 - Medium HM (M) or 2000 kg DM/ha - High HM (H). Herbage accumula...

Grazing lawns are a distinct grassland community type, characterised by short-stature and with their persistence and spread promoted by grazing. In Africa, they reveal a long co-evolutionary history of grasses and large mammal grazers. The attractiveness to grazers of a low-biomass sward lies in the relatively high quality of forage, largely due to the low proportion of stem material in the swa...

The structure and dynamics of insect community in grasslands can be influenced by grazing management via altered characteristics of plant community. However, attempts to better understand the complex relationships among plants, insects, and large herbivores is still hampered largely by the interactive effects of plants, insects, and large grazers on each other. In this study, we test the hypoth...