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Grazing Lands Technical Publications

Updated 06/13/2008

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Conquest of the Land Through 7,000 Years

These publications require Adobe Acrobat.

Adobe Acrobat DocumentAnti-Quality Factors in Rangeland and Pastureland Forages - This 67-page bulletin reviews anti-quality factors that influence livestock production on both pasturelands and rangelands. As more emphasis is placed on forages for animal production, potential limitations need to be better understood. (.62 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentForaging Behavior: Managing to Survive in a World of Change - Behavioral Principles for Human, Animal, Vegetation, and Ecosystem Management.  This booklet and companion DVD was written by Dr. Fred Provenza, a professor at Utah State.  It explores the interrelationships between plants and grazing/browsing animals.

Adobe Acrobat DocumentGrazing Land Economics Made Simple - Understanding Internal Rate of Return and Net Present Value (for printing purposes only) - A 13-page booklet developed by GLTI which was written for field office personnel to provide a simple view of some complex economic principles. (.19 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentGuide to Pasture Condition Scoring - Developed by GLTI in May 2001, the guide is used to inform landowners as well as professionals of the 10 indicators of pasture condition and the 6 causative factors affecting plant vigor with a procedure to assess each indicator. (1.98 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentInterpreting Indicators for Rangeland Health, Version 4 - Technical Reference 1734-6, dated 2005, is a booklet developed through inter-agency coordination between the BLM, NRCS, ARS, and USGS. It provides land specialists with the tools to do a preliminary evaluation of soil/site stability, hydrologic function, and integrity of the biotic community on rangelands. (5.8 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentIntroduction to Microbiotic Crusts - A 13-page booklet developed by GLTI and the Soil Quality Institute which provides the latest information to NRCS personnel and landowners on microbiotic crusts and how they impact soils, hydrology, and plant communities. (1.9 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentInventorying, Classifying, and Correlation of Juniper and Pinyon Communities to Soils in Western United States - A 39-page booklet developed by GLTI which provides guidance during all progressive soil surveys and during ecological site description development or revision in the inventorying, classifying, and correlating of Juniper and Pinyon ecosystems into ecological sites. (4.5 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentManaging Grasslands For Profit - Produced by NRCS in cooperation with several partners in July 2000, this 19-page booklet is a guide to grazing management in the Southeast U.S. (8.7 MB) 

Monitoring Manual for Grassland, Shrubland and Savanna Ecosystems ... - developed with the ARS Jornada Experimenal Range.  This manual describes how to monitor three rangeland attributes: soil and site stability, watershed function and biotic integrity. Nearly everything we value about rangelands depends on these attributes.  Monitoring these three attributes is like monitoring the foundation of our rangeland ecosystems.  The measurements used to monitor these attributes also can be used to generate indicators relevant to specific management objectives, such as maintaining wildlife habitat, biodiversity conservation or producing forage.

Adobe Acrobat DocumentNational Forage Quality and Animal Well Being - A 74-page booklet developed by GLTI, dated October 2000, gives results from 44 states that participated in this national NRCS project from 1997-99. Nutritional monitoring using fecal samples allows assessment of diet forage and grazing management. (1.1 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentPasture Condition Score Sheet - A tool to record the condition of the indicators and evaluate the pasture. This goes with the Guide to Pasture Condition Scoring. (56 KB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentPrescribed Grazing and Feeding Management for Lactating Dairy Cows (1.54 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentTN.190.RP.1 : “PROFITABLE GRAZING-BASED DAIRY SYSTEMS”
Well-managed grazing-based dairies help protect soil, water, air, plant, and animal resources by maintaining permanent vegetative cover on the soil, increasing soil organic matter, improving the distribution of nutrients on fields, and reducing the potential for odors, spills, or runoff from concentrated animal housing, feed lots, and waste storage areas. Compared with traditional confinement dairies, grazing-based dairies have more wildlife, more diverse plant communities, and healthier cows with longer productive lives. In addition, grazing-based dairies often boost income by reducing feed, labor, equipment, and fuel costs.  This Technical Note provides background and general guidance on the concept of grazing-based dairy systems, defined as land management systems that seek to optimize dairy production through grazing. It focuses on associated economic, environmental, and social benefits. This document is intended to support and encourage the start-up of grazing-based dairy farms across the Nation.  The technical information contained in this document gives NRCS conservation planners and technicians, dairy producers, and others the background information necessary to help producers transition from confinement dairies to grazing-based dairies.

Adobe Acrobat DocumentRangeland Cover Types in the United States - published by the Society for Range Management in 1994, editor Thomas N. Shiflet (22.7 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentSampling Vegetation Attributes - Developed by an inter-agency group, this reference material will help you determine what kind of sampling technique to use and how to set up and run monitoring studies. (171 pages)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentStates, transitions, and thresholds: Further refinement for rangeland applications. Special Report 1024, March 2001 (1.48 MB)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentUtilization Studies and Residual Measurements - Developed by an inter-agency group, this reference material aids in the development and operation of studies to help determine utilization of grazing resources. (174 pages)

Adobe Acrobat DocumentWorking Trees for Livestock - Agroforestry: Silvopasture in the Southeast - A 4-page brochure developed by the National Agroforestry Center. (.41 MB)