Achieving multiple management goals is a priority for working grassland landscapes in California. Rangeland managers are particularly interested in identifying plant species and varieties that provide high forage value while also resisting invasion from noxious, unpalatable species and demonstrating robustness to the effects of drought. We initiated a four year study to investigate the initial value of 24 annual and perennial forages to provide adequate ground cover, forage production and resilience to the presence of weedy species and grazing. We found that the most successful varieties in the short term ('Blando' brome, 'Grouse' chicory and 'Rush' intermediate wheatgrass) declined precipitously through time and were dissimilar to the most successful species in the long term (harding grasses 'Perla', 'Holdfast', and 'Advanced AT'). Soil type affected cover of varieties in idiosyncratic ways, and weed cover generally negatively affected most varieties, with the exception of 'Tonic' plantain, 'Paiute' and 'Kara' orchardgrass, 'Winfred' brassica, 'Gala' brome and 'Grouse' chicory.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.