A century of grazing: The value of long-term research

• DOI: 10.2489/jswc.71.1.5a
• Publication Date: 2016-01-02T14:57:58Z
• Authors: Matt A. Sanderson; Mark A. Liebig; John R. Hendrickson; Scott L. Kronberg; David Toledo; Justin D. Derner; Justin L. Reeves
• Keywords: Agroecosystem

Long-term research is critical to understanding the sustainability of agroecosystems. This especially true for rangelands in an era extreme weather, climate change, and land use change. Since its inception 1912, USDA Agricultural Research Service, Northern Great Plains Laboratory (NGPRL) at Mandan, North Dakota, has focused on ecology, management, native rangeland. A century ago, Johnson Thatcher Sarvis a small group scientists NGPRL set out answer very practical question: how many acres prairie does it take support steer during grazing season? To that question they began stocking rate study 1915 101 ha (250 ac) mixed-grass prairie. Part original experiment continues today as one longest running experiments America. Scientific accomplishments from long-term have been summarized recently (Sanderson et al. 2015). Here we describe site being leveraged future.