SGS-LTER Grazing Strategies for Mountain Plover: Vegetation Cover by Daubenmire Classes on the Central Plains Experimental Range, Nunn, Colorado, USA 2004 - 2007

We aim to test the limits of the SGS to grazing by altering both the seasonality and intensity of grazing. Grazing intensities outside the traditional boundaries of grazing intensity and seasonality can interact with physiography to induce changes in vegetation states. To test this hypothesis we will assess vegetation composition, ANPP, diversity and structure in an experiment that began in 2003 (Grazing Seasonality and Intensity). Since livestock can modify vegetation composition and structure to alter habitat and resources for other organisms (Derner et al. 2009), manipulations of the seasonality and intensity of grazing therefore may be used as a tool to create habitat for species of conservation concern. Two treatments involve manipulations of livestock grazing in spring and summer at very high (80%) grazing intensities.