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Cattle producers, including stocker operators, often find themselves at the mercy of forces outside their control, such as weather and markets. Their success often depends on their ability to manage the factors they can control, to optimize returns when conditions are good and minimize losses when weather or markets turn against them. One of those factors is the maintenance of a productive and sustainable forage resource, and rangeland monitoring is a critical tool toward achieving that goal. That was the message from a group of range-management specialists who conducted a session on rangeland monitoring during Cattlemen’s College at the Beef Industry Convention in Phoenix. University of Arizona range management specialist George Ruyle presented a summary of considerations for rangeland vegetation monitoring, saying the purpose of monitoring is to document change over time in vegetation or other aspects of the rangeland resource, and to relate these changes to management. Ruyle says there are a number of basic assumptions to consider when initially developing, implementing and interpreting data from a monitoring program.