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RESEARCH ON SUSTAINABLE
RANGELAND MANAGEMENT
Research Needs in the 21st Century
1. Does the indicator assess the criterion?
2. At what scales are the indicator valid?
3. How do we come up with thresholds?
4. How to we integrate the criteria?
ECC versus Percent Bare Ground by Site
80
60
40
ECC
20
0
-10
Rsq = 0.7734
0
10
20
Percent Bare Ground
30
40
50
60
70
Maintenance and Enhancement of Multiple Economic
and Social Benefits to Current and Future Generations
Community-level indicators that might be relevant to
sustainability:
•Value produced by agriculture and recreation as percent of
total economy.
•Land tenure, land use, ownership patterns by size class
•Population pyramid and population change
Scale in Ecological Observations
Grain = Resolving power of data.
Grain determines smallest entities
that can be found in data.
Extent = highest level that can be
accessed.
If size of entity is larger than data
(spatial, temporal), then associated
attributes cannot be observed.
FREQUENCY OF BEHAVIOR
- Systems have particular characteristic frequencies.
- Monitoring must accommodate frequency of a system’s scale.
The larger the system,
the longer the cycle time of
unperturbed behavior.
From top to bottom of a
hierarchy, there is a continuum
of natural frequencies.
Research on Benefits to
Management in the Field
An issue of scale and interactions among indicators
•
•
•
•
Fire
Invasive species
Drought
Exurban development
Thresholds
•
Thresholds related to Sustainability
•
•
•
•
Biodiversity
Biodiversity
Fragmentation
Invasive species
• Soil cover
Ecosystem resilience
Productive capacity
Biodiversity
Biodiversity &
Productive capacity
Erosion
Evaluating Rangeland Sustainability
SRM Task Group on Unity and
Concepts in Terms
Rangelands 17(3):85-92
1995
• Focused on the site level; i.e. rangeland condition and trend.
• Soil is the basic resource.
• Sought unity in terminology and methodology.
Site conservation thresholds
Site Conservation rating: sustainable and unsustainable
Sustainability as Expressed by Forms of Capital
• Capital has investment value
• Sustainability attained when combination of
investments provide for future needs of society.
Human capital:
Resources of individuals
Social capital:
Resources of communities
Natural capital:
Resources from nature.
Financial capital:
Resources measured in dollars.
NRI / FIA / etc. 2
Rangeland monitoring
systems incorporate
new protocols.
1
SRR
Validates/develops
indicators and
measurement protocols.
no
Are the indicators
valid and useful?
yes
3
NAT’L
ASSESSMENTS
Monitors trends of SRR
indicators.