Due to the increasing cost and concern of catastrophic wildfires in the Western United States, there is an increasing interest in fuels reduction projects. Fuel reduction treatments utilize various methods of thinning and/or prescribed fire to obtain desirable forest stand conditions. However, the effects of fuels reduction on ecosystem function...
Management and conservation of rangelands are increasingly concerned with maintaining productivity, species composition, and diversity of native plant communities. We estimated aboveground annual productivity, species composition, and diversity of a native bunchgrass type community across 1152, 0.5 m2 plots at The Nature Conservancy’s Zumwalt Prairie Preserve in northeastern Oregon. Standing...
Mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus), elk (Cervus elaphus), and cattle share rangelands throughout much of interior western North America. Considerable debate exists about the degree to which facilitation or competition occurs for forage between these three species (Nelson 1982, Wisdom and Thomas 1996, Miller 2002). Prior cattle grazing can have beneficial...
A study was conducted to determine foraging efficiency of cattle, mule deer, and elk in response to previous grazing by elk and cattle. Four enclosures, in previously logged mixed conifer (Abies grandis) rangelands were chosen, and within each enclosure, three 0.75 ha pastures were either: 1) ungrazed, 2) grazed by...
We assessed a photographic technique to estimate shrub yield and utilization of common snowberry, snowbrush, and heart-leafed willow found in mixed-conifer rangelands. We determined the correlation between green leaf area size (LA) and forage yield (Y) and compared plant utilization estimated by photographic technique (ULA) to actual utilization (UY) values....
Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the influence of a yeast-derived cell wall preparation (YCW) on forage intake and digestibility, ruminal fermentation characteristics, serum prolactin and prolactin stores, and milk production in beef cattle consuming high-alkaloid tall fescue straw. In Exp. 1, 16 Angus x Hereford ruminally cannulated steers (200...
The objective of this study was to quantify understory species diversity response to overstory manipulation of Blue Mountain eco-region forest. Forty nine ecological land units, including differing successional stages (sapling, pole, small saw, and saw log) and canopy cover (light and medium) in dry Grand Fir (Abies grandis), wet Grand...
The objective of this study was to quantify understory vegetation response to overstory manipulation of Blue Mountain eco-region forest. Forty nine ecological land units, including differing successional stages (sapling, pole, small saw, and saw log) and canopy cover (light and medium) in dry Grand Fir (Abies grandis), wet Grand Fir,...
We conducted a study to compare the bite-count technique (BC) of estimating forage intake and synthesized diet quality to direct estimates of diet quantity and quality with the use of the rumen evacuation technique (RE). We used four rumen-fistulated steers to evaluate both techniques. Four enclosures in a mixed-conifer rangeland...
The estimation of standing crop is important in the management of rangeland resources. Direct measurements by clipping, drying, and weighing of herbaceous vegetation are time-consuming and labor-intensive. Therefore, non-destructive methods for efficiently and accurately estimating standing crop are needed in rangeland forage management. We assessed a visual obstruction (VO) technique...