FORAGE DEVELOPMENT
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• Eliminate undesirable plants to give a competitive advantage to herbaceous grass and legume • • • • • •
species and browse trees and shrubs. Reseed/over-sow range units that have favorable amount and distribution of rainfall with desirable forage species. Ensure fair distribution of watering facilities to ensure more equitable grazing pressure over the grazing resource. Develop efficient extension and veterinary services. Establish feedlots to increase offtake. Develop water-harvesting techniques, e.g., introduce earthen-pond construction and other techniques. Develop infrastructure: roads, veterinary clinics, marketing facilities, farmer training centres, etc.
8.5.7. Monitoring and proper utilization of rangelands
Primary indicators and the theory of proper use The first indicator is too heavy grazing, beyond the growth capability of plants. When the best plants are overgrazed, the manager should take this as a sign for need of precaution and take appropriate measures. Improvements can be made by not grazing primary choice plants in excess of the permissive 50% of production for the season. The theory of proper use states ‘never graze more than 50% by weight of those better plants by the end of the grazing season’. The following need to be known to implement this theory:
• The primary choice plants. • What makes up 50% of current production, usually done by field sampling. Monitoring of range forage using key site and key species Key site is a grazing area which livestock instinctively prefer to graze first, and from where they consume the most forage throughout the grazing period. Key range site serves as a standard measure of the current use and management requirement of the entire range. Key species are plant species that are more attractive to livestock than any other species in a range. They are high quality forage of a climax decreaser category (components of the climax vegetation that decrease in abundance with increasing grazing intensity). Key species serve as a unit of measure as to how to use the entire range.
Judging range sites using key site and key species Key range site and key species can be used as a unit of measure in the utilization and management of a range. The principle is that if the most favored range site, along with the best forage species in the range, has not deteriorated neither will any other site in the range.
Selecting a key range site A key range site is a site which is grazed the hardest and deteriorates rapidly if not properly managed. Sheep and Goat Production Handbook for Ethiopia