Article written by Jacob Court
West Texas Rangelands Intern
Graduate Student – Texas A&M University
Rangelands are one of the most important ecosystems in the United States, providing habitat for wildlife, forage for livestock, and many environmental and recreational benefits. However, rangelands are currently facing many issues, including woody plant encroachment, invasive species spreading, and overgrazing. Many of these issues stem from how we currently manage our rangelands. The article Rangeland Resilience: Using Fire and Grazing Together discusses how including both prescribed fire and livestock grazing techniques into management systems can help to create a healthier ecosystem. Both fire and grazing are beneficial natural disturbances that rangelands evolved alongside, so reintroducing them can help to restore the environment to what it once was.
Historically, rangelands evolved alongside both fire and grazing; therefore, by reinstating both fire and grazing, we can begin to mimic these natural processes and, in doing so, promote more diverse landscapes and
enhance the biodiversity of the area. Utilizing fire and grazing techniques in various amalgamations is called pyric herbivory. Burning different areas at different times helps to create spaces where both warm and cool-season plants can thrive, which in turn helps to stabilize forage production. In addition to supporting plant and animal populations, pyric herbivory helps improve ecosystem services like soil health and water quality. Once pyric herbivory is in place, it becomes a self-reinforcing process.
Pyric herbivory is the combination of prescribed fire and timed grazing. In these systems, livestock are allowed to graze shortly after an area is burned. This allows them to feed on the high-quality new growth that shortly follows fire. It also allows for the suppression of any unwanted plants that would grow quickly and take over post-fire, which in turn promotes a more diverse array of plants. Ideally, in the 12 months post-burn, high-intensity grazing would be taking place. Goats are great for this as they selectively choose what they want to feed on and therefore can target the high-quality regrowth. In the one-to-three year range post-fire, it’s important to slightly back off on the grazing intensity. Moderately grazing the area during this time will allow for efficient regrowth of plants to take place. After this period, let the area rest and accumulate fuel for the next burn. A great way to implement this is by the patch-burn method. This method utilizes a rotational system where the entire area is not burned at one time, and instead focuses on creating a mosaic of areas in different stages of burn through recovery. Rotational grazing can be easily implemented into this system as you can rotate pastures that are in stages of burn, grazing, or recovering.
Historically, bison and other animals grazed upon the rangelands. Wildfires burned frequently across the rangeland, and their size and speed were limited due to the lack of fuel buildup. Due to our current management systems, these beneficial natural processes aren’t normal anymore. If we take the time and effort to integrate livestock grazing and prescribed burning, the natural cycle of pyric herbivory can benefit our rangelands. Utilizing these natural processes to help manage the land can be difficult to incorporate, but it helps to foster the long-term sustainability that we are currently missing. With adequate planning and adaptability, this approach can create rangelands that handle drought better, have less uncontrollable wildfire risk, and are more diverse.
References:
Texas A&M AgriLife Extension – Rangeland Resilience: Using Fire and Grazing Together