Proceedings brand creation for a prescribed fire culture – utilizing key social media parameters. Lars Coleman*1, J. Kelly Hoffman1, Thomas McDaniel1, R. Patrick Bixler2, Urs P. Kreuter1, Morgan Russell3

Restoration efforts in the western US occur across a diverse array of plant communities and climatic conditions. Restoration is likely constrained by different factors in different locations, but few efforts have compared the outcomes of rangeland restoration experiments across broad spatial scales. We compared results from multiple studies to evaluate the roles of water availability, plant-plant interactions, and herbivory as drivers of restoration success across three dramatically different ecosystems: arid sagebrush steppe in north-central Nevada, slightly wetter sagebrush shrublands in northwestern Arizona, and a semi-arid shrubland-grassland ecotone in northeastern Wyoming. At the most arid sites, efforts to directly increase available moisture during plant establishment led to long-lasting restoration benefits. In an eroded old-field, irrigating for two growing seasons led to 6.7 times higher perennial grass cover and fewer large vegetation gaps, even three years after irrigation ceased. In another Nevada study, seed coatings designed to increase available moisture had mixed effects, but were generally beneficial when planted species were grazed during the second growing season. In Arizona, however, seed coatings had negative rather than positive effects. Across all sites, we found evidence that plant establishment was constrained by competition with other, already-established plants. In both the most arid and the most mesic locations, established perennial grasses inhibited shrub establishment. In Arizona, established perennial grasses reduced perennial grass seedling establishment. Plant-plant competition in semi-arid systems may reflect underlying competition for available soil moisture, but few studies have tested this mechanism in a restoration context. Overall, our results suggest that direct manipulations of moisture may be critical for restoration at the most arid sites, and a recognition of competition from established perennial plants is relevant across a wide range of arid and semi-arid systems.

ACTIVE OLD-FIELD RESTORATION IN THE MOST ARID LANDS OF THE GREAT BASIN
. Elizabeth A. Leger*¹, Jay Davison², Wally W. Miller¹, Benjamin Sullivan¹, Shauna Uselman¹, Lauren M. Porensky³, Owen Baughman¹; ¹University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, ²Univ. NV Cooperative Extension, Fallon, NV, ³USDA-ARS, Fort Collins, CO

ABSTRACT

Restoration of former agricultural fields can be challenging, especially in arid systems, where factors such as wind erosion, water stress, soil alteration, and competition from weeds can strongly affect plant establishment and growth. Experiments were conducted in two former agricultural fields in Nevada’s Mason Valley, testing the effects of irrigation timing, seed source, and seeding order on restoration outcomes. Multiple sources of grass and shrub seeds were drill seeded in four strategies: 1) simultaneously in year one, 2) shrubs only in year one, 3) grasses in year one followed by shrubs in year two, or 4) shrubs seeded alone in year two, after a year of weed control. Irrigation was applied to all treatments in either spring or fall + spring for two years, and we monitored emergence and survival for three years. All treatments affected performance, but results were highly context dependent. For example, in a higher fertility field, fall + spring irrigation increased shrub seedling emergence, while grasses had higher emergence in spring-only irrigation treatments. In contrast, in a lower-fertility field, there was no effect of irrigation timing on seedling densities of grasses or shrubs. In both fields, shrubs emerged best when seeded in year two, either alone or after grasses. In this treatment, shrubs from more local seed sources outperformed more distant collections while irrigation was ongoing, but, after dramatic declines in shrub densities after irrigation ceased, this effect did not persist. In contrast, commercially-available, non-local grasses initially outperformed more local grass sources under some scenarios, but after irrigation ceased, these advantages either disappeared or more local grasses outperformed commercial sources. Our trials indicate that supplemental irrigation and seed source can affect restoration outcomes in arid old fields, but results can vary greatly, even between fields in very close proximity. Because of these highly context-dependent results, a bet-hedging strategy that uses a variety of seed sources and irrigation treatments within an overall restoration plan may maximize the chances of restoration success. 

INTRODUCTION. Lawrence D. Ford*¹, James W. Bartolome²; ¹University of California Santa Cruz, Felton, CA, ²University of California, Berkeley, CA

The introduction to this symposium will describe: why this is an important subject for study and applications to management; the plan for conducting the symposium; and the framework of talk topics and titles.

CALIFORNIA’S MEDITERRANEAN GRASSLANDS: BIODIVERSITY AND THREATS. Sasha Gennet*; The Nature Conservancy, San Francisco, CA

ABSTRACT

California's rangelands are a global biological diversity hotspot, and provide high forage production and other ecosystem service values. However, over 200,000 hectares of grasslands and oak woodlands have been converted since the 1980's due to heavy demand for irrigated agricultural crops, housing, and associated infrastructure to support the state's booming population. Land values continue to spike statewide, exacerbating the pressure on many landowners to sell or convert their lands, and stretching public and private conservation dollars ever thinner. Warmer temperatures and highly variable rainfall, a complex regulatory environment, aging ranch infrastructure, and invasive species are also amplifying the challenges ranchers and rangeland managers are facing. We will explore these threats in maps and stories, and propose a variety of solutions and strategies to conserve California's Mediterranean grasslands and oak woodlands.

MANAGING ANIMAL SELECTIVITY TO ENHANCE BIODIVERSITY IN CALIFORNIA’S MEDITERRANEAN GRASSLANDS
. Lynn Huntsinger*; University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA

ABSTRACT

The selectivity of grazing animals distinguishes grazing as a vegetation management process from other tools such as prescribed burning and mowing.  Selective grazing has been presented as a problem in rangeland science since its inception, however, managers have gradually begun turning to taking advantage of selectivity rather than using grazing systems and other methods to suppress it. In California’s annual grasslands, it is achieving widespread use on annual grasslands for creating within-year changes in annual grassland structure and composition, as well as driving long term changes in the grassland and woody vegetation.  Temporal and spatial scale of vegetation management goals are critical to managing animal selection.  Within-year grazing generated changes in habitat have been quite successful, including managing for vernal pools, a variety of endangered and rare species, and pollinators.  Carry-over effects are far less certain, including native grass restoration and persisting control of pest species.  Discovering the links between highly heterogeneous abiotic factors and biotic factors like herbivory at appropriate scale is critical to these efforts. Researchers in other parts of the world report similar results, although the supplantation of California’s native grasslands by non-native annuals also has an important role.  Can the fundamental principles of managing selectivity be apply in other ecosystems?  In Nevada, with the widespread invasion of cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) managers have already begun using related techniques to manage the annual non-native grass.   

DRIVERS OF CALIFORNIA’S MEDITERRANEAN GRASSLAND BIODIVERSITY
. James W. Bartolome*¹, Peter J. Hopkinson², Michael D. White¹; ¹University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, ²University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA

ABSTRACT

Mediterranean grassland dynamics can be usefully understood as more closely fitting assumptions of non-equilibrium than equilibrium models. This implies that factors external to the system like low and erratic rainfall predominate, and factors like competition and grazing play lesser roles in determining community structure and diversity. Threshold models that include alternative stable states and persistent equilibria may incorporate assumptions leading to greater emphasis on control by biotic processes. The utility of models for predicting the relationships among drivers and grassland biodiversity are proposed to be highly dependent on drivers like topography, parent material, soils, and rainfall on more arid grassland sites. This contrasts to locally and/or seasonally mesic sites where biotic drivers like herbivory, reproductive output, and competition play a greater role. The choice of spatial and temporal scales upon which descriptive and explanatory models are built play an important role in determining how biodiversity drivers are explained. 

FRAGMENTATION AND OWNERSHIP OF CALIFORNIA’S MEDITERRANEAN GRASSLAND — EFFECTS ON BIODIVERSITY AND STEWARDSHIP. Luke Macaulay*, Felix P. Ratcliff; University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA

ABSTRACT

Land ownership is one of the primary determinants of how rangelands are used and property size has been shown to drive many land use decisions. As such, knowledge about land ownership characteristics is key to understanding rangeland production, land fragmentation, and biodiversity conservation. This information is also useful in targeting outreach materials to improve production and conservation practices. Using a parcel dataset containing all 58 California counties we describe the characteristics of Mediterranean rangeland ownership across California and discuss the implications for livestock production and biodiversity conservation.

DEVELOPING REGIONALLY SPECIFIC GRAZING PRACTICES TO PROMOTE PRODUCTION, PROFITABILITY, AND ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

Rangelands are valued for their capacity to provide diverse suites of ecosystem services, from food production to carbon storage to biological diversity. Although rangelands worldwide share common characteristics, differences among biogeographic regions result in differences in the types of opportunities for ranchers and other rangeland managers to preserve and enhance multiple services. For instance, opportunities to use grazing to promote biodiversity while meeting growing global demand for beef vary among the rangelands of Mediterranean California, the Chihuahuan Desert, and the Great Plains, USA. The drivers of these regional differences are biophysical, social, and economic. Understanding the drivers and their interactions can improve planning for regionally specific grazing practices, land uses, funding programs, and scientific research that optimize the provision of multiple services from U.S. rangelands. We present a model identifying the drivers that differentiate regional opportunities, and use it to compare grazing management options in Mediterranean California with those in other rangeland regions across the United States.  

EFFECTS OF CATTLE ON RIPARIAN VEGETATION IN THE SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY, CALIFORNIA. Felix P. Ratcliff*¹, James W. Bartolome¹, Luke Macaulay²; ¹University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, ²UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA

In arid rangelands, riparian areas are important components of ranching operations that also provide critical ecosystem services, including: habitat for fish and wildlife, increased landscape biodiversity, and regulation of the fate and transport of nutrients and pathogens. Many of these ecosystem services are mediated by vegetation composition and structure. In Mediterranean California, rangeland riparian sites likely behave in a non-equilibrium manner, where external abiotic factors shape vegetation composition and structure at multiple scales. Despite this, livestock are often cited as a major cause of rangeland riparian degradation. We monitored vegetation change along 5 creeks at Tejon Ranch in southern California, and found that livestock impacted vegetation in unexpected ways. Over two years, moderate cattle activity decreased cover of upland plants, exotic plants, forbs and grasses. Cover of wetland and native plants were unaffected by cattle, however bare ground significantly increased when cattle were present. There was also a near-significant increase in woody plant seedling abundance on grazed plots. Notwithstanding these effects on plant functional groups, a classification-based analysis of vegetation showed that cattle grazing had little effect on plant community composition. The results suggest that understanding the effects of cattle on riparian vegetation depends not only on the spatial and temporal scales of the investigation, but also on the way the vegetation response is framed.

POLICIES GOVERNING GRAZING TO BENEFIT CALIFORNIA’S GRASSLAND BIODIVERSITY
. Sheila Barry*; UCCE, San Jose, CA

ABSTRACT

The primary driver of grazing policies to benefit California’s grassland biodiversity is the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA).  California has 301 federally listed threatened or endangered species.  Since seventy percent (70%) of these species (212) have some nexus with livestock grazing with many of them occurring on grassland, the ESA has widespread impact on the conservation and management of California’s grassland.  Required mitigation for loss of habitat and impacts to species as a result of development and public works projects is resulting in a growing number of conservation easements being placed on both private and public-owned grasslands.  These easements include a conservation management plan, which typically permits and often requires livestock grazing to manage the grassland habitat for the species being conserved.  On public lands, even without an easement, livestock grazing to achieve specific habitat conservation goals may be required depending on the interests and needs of the public agency.  Although there is an increase in the amount of conservation planning and monitoring as a result of the ESA, there is often little science used to guide appropriate grazing management or effective monitoring; agencies do not require the involvement of a California licensed Certified Rangeland Manager, even though state law requires it.  Other regulations and policies that influence grazing and its potential impacts to biodiversity on California’s grasslands, especially on public lands include California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), Nation Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Natural Community Conservation Planning Act (NCCP), water quality regulations including Federal Clean Water Act, federal and state coastal zone regulations and California’s Porter-Cologne Act, and public access and use requirements. These regulations can create both challenges and opportunities for implementing grazing management that could benefit biodiversity in California’s grasslands.

GRAZING MANAGEMENT PLANNING FOR ADAPTIVE STEWARDSHIP. Lawrence D. Ford*¹, Peter J. Hopkinson²; ¹University of California Santa Cruz, Felton, CA, ²University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA

The need to conserve declining special-status species and natural communities is severe.  Controversy over livestock grazing practices and lack of scientific research to guide grazing management in specific habitats hinders progress in effectively deploying this important landscape-level conservation tool. To improve conservation outcomes amidst controversy and scientific uncertainty, we propose land managers implement the Adaptive Stewardship grazing model. Essential elements of the Adaptive Stewardship grazing model include:

• 
  development of a site-specific grazing management plan as the initial step in using grazing for conservation purposes
  
• 
  planning focuses on key adjustments to grazing practices and landowner leasing and supervision practices that are most likely to make conventional ranching better at achieving conservation and sustainability objectives
  
• 
  flexibility of grazing practices and focus on achieving performance standards (results over methods)
  
• 
  development of special-status species and natural community habitat needs into grazing management targets at specified places and during specified seasons
  
• 
  incentives for rancher stewardship
  
• 
  monitoring design to generate quantitative and qualitative results on the highest priority variables to efficiently inform and guide grazing and related activities throughout the grazing season as well as annual adaptations of the grazing strategy or the overall grazing plan
  
• 
  cost minimization through efficient use of rancher services, monitoring, supervision, and administration.
  

ADAPTATIVE MANAGEMENT IN THE SOCIAL ECOSYSTEM OF PUBLIC GRAZING . Tipton D. Hudson*; Washington State University, Ellensburg, WA

Grazing management is not rocket science -- it's much more complex than than. Numerous scholars and practitioners have quipped that rangeland management is both art and science, and strongly both. This is because there are hundreds of variables affecting plant communities and the domestic animals managed by humans, which exist separate from the (at least) dozens  of sociological and psychological variables affecting the humans' decision-making processes and the humans' relative abilities to consider all of the interactions between the hundreds of natural variables, interactions which number in the many thousands. It is no wonder that ranchers feel strongly that, to some extent, they must manage "by feel", and that when permit administrators want to follow rigid guidelines it seems overly simplistic. Nevertheless, not everyone is a good artist, and good artists almost invariably become good by mimicking masters and following rules, which agencies are compelled to provide. In a best-case scenario, range/forest managers and livestock operators will work together to manage animals, people, plant communities, and the mix ecological goods & services under some kind of adaptive approach. Several kinds of adaptability are needed: flexibility in grazing on and off dates, flexibility in duration of grazing, flexibility in stock density to accomplish varying grazing intensities relative to the plant community and long-term landscape goals, and flexibility in the methods used to enforce the provisions of a permit, especially where older permits omit language about adaptive management.

ADAPTIVE MANAGEMENT: A FOREST SERVICE PERSPECTIVE. Chad Horman*; US Forest Service, Cedar City, UT

ABSTRACT

Adaptive management has been discussed and proposed in allotment management plans (AMPs) and in National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) documents over the past 20 years. During this time there have been successes and failures in how it has been defined, analyzed and implemented. Topics that will be explored from a Forest Service perspective are: defining adaptability and adaptive management; the constraints and boundaries that define how adaptable the Forest Service can be; and examples of success and failures in applying adaptability and adaptive management.

FOREST SERVICE ADAPTIVE MANAGEMENT POLICIES AND IMPLEMENTATION
. Judith Dyess*; U.S. Forest Service, Albuquerque, NM

ABSTRACT

The USDA Forest Service recognizes the need for flexibility to adapt grazing management on rangelands due to weather, disturbance such as wildfire, ecological dynamics, response and variability.  The Forest Service is required to conduct analysis per the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for the authorization of grazing on National Forest System lands.  Guidance for conducting this analysis is found in the Grazing Permit Administration Handbook (FSH2209.13_90).  NEPA requires analyzing and disclosing environmental effects, and taking public comment.  National direction incorporates integrating adaptive management into the proposed action.  For adaptive management to be successfully analyzed a description of the likely adaptive management practices needs to depicted.  This provides the responsible official the ability to facilitate changes in management that are needed to meet resource management objectives and/or improve resource conditions.  Adaptive management is a system of management practices based on clearly identified intended outcomes and monitoring to determine if management actions are meeting those outcomes; and, if not, to facilitate management changes that will best ensure that those outcomes are met or re-evaluated.  Adaptive management stems from the recognition that knowledge about natural resource systems is sometimes uncertain.  Management flexibility is required to respond to unpredictable ecosystem drivers and stressors, such as drought, flooding and fire events.  Adaptations may also provide for minor modifications that are needed due to changed conditions or new information.  Implementation and effectiveness monitoring are essential components to successful adaptive management.  Monitoring and collaboration with stakeholders and permittees provides an ongoing feedback loop for the need to maintain or change management on the ground.  The Southwestern Region of the Forest Service has supplemented national direction emphasizing collaborative development of proposed actions which articulate the associated adaptive management and monitoring necessary to manage authorized grazing towards the achievement of resource objectives and desired conditions. 

THE ROLE OF PERMITTEE/AGENCY RELATIONSHIP IN ADAPTIVE MANAGEMENT

Adaptive Management in Natural Resources is often messy, rarely preventative, contentious, and often we must act without scientific certainty. Much of the time permittees or managers are adapting to things we can’t predict. Both the permittees and range specialists must make decisions on the fly that are not necessarily covered in a NEPA document or in an AOI. Positive relationships between the rancher and agency are critical. It is the responsibility of both the rancher and agency to foster these relationships. Collaborative monitoring has been a successful strategy to help improve permittee/agency relationships.

PROVIDING FLEXIBILITY FOR GRAZING MANAGEMENT IN OUTCOME BASED GRAZING AUTHORIZATIONS. Richard Mayberry*; USDI Bureau of Land Management, Gettysburg, PA

ABSTRACT

Explore how flexibility is defined and applied in Outcome Based Grazing, and discuss differences from flexibility provided in Allotment Management Plans.  Providing a framework for excercising grazing management decisionsis a key component of the Outcome Based Grazing Authorization.  Developing the objectives, monitoring and evaluation plan and identifying potential managment actions provide the framework for the Authorization.

CONSTRAINTS TO ADAPTABILITY IN ALLOTMENT MANAGEMENT. Les Owen*; Colorado Department of Agriculture, Broomfield, CO