Home > Science Program Areas > Grassland, Shrubland and Desert Ecosystems
Grassland, Shrubland and Desert Ecosystems
The Grassland, Shrubland and Desert Ecosystem Research Program
addresses the biology, use, management, and restoration of vast tracts
of land including National Forest System and other public lands that
are important for human well-being and landscape health, biodiversity,
productivity, watersheds, and sustainability. Ecosystems dominated by
grasses and shrubs occupy 75 percent (353 million ha) of the potenial
natural vegetation of the 17 western conterminous United States. These
ecosystems including grasslands, shrublands, shrub steppe, and pinyon juniper
woodlands (for the most part inseparably bound with the shrublands
upon which they are dependant) can be very large, e.g., sagebrush,
short grass praire, creosote bush, salt desert shrub. However, topographic
diversity coupled with variable precipitation patterns, agricultural
development, and riparian corridors impose mosaics and discontinuities.
Ecotones and edge effects make for diverse landscapes including
some that are not sustainable in their present condition. Disruptions by
large-scale clearing for agriculture, water diversions, the introduction
of an extensive domestic livestock grazing industry, changes in the native
fauna, the advent of alien weeds, altered fire regimes, and increases
in human-caused insect and disease epidemics have contributed to produce
areas that are in unsuitable condition. Research is needed to
understand and manage these plant communities and their associated
biota. Scientists of the research program with interdisciplinary skills are
located in laboratories in South Dakota, New Mexico, Idaho, Montana,
Utah, and Nevada. They and cooperating scientists and land managers
are working on solving ecological problems, identifying and developing
native plants for restoration, controlling and managing invasive weeds,
and improving wildlife habitats and rangelands.
Program Website
This program
does not have an official website.
A general idea
of the program's research can be garnered from the links below. They represent the
major research projects (aka RWUs) incorporated into the program.
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Congressional Notebook
