Get reliable rangeland science

Achieving conservation goals in California's spatially and temporally variable grasslands requires management approaches that are both opportunistic and adaptive. Ecological site classifications and state-and-transition models are useful conceptual tools for such management. In 2008, when the Tejon Ranch Conservancy set out to develop an adaptive management plan to meet multiple conservation objectives for 240,000 acres of conserved lands, official, approved Ecological Site Descriptions were available for only a small fraction of sites to be managed. To describe and understand spatial and temporal dynamics across 100,000 acres of Tejon grasslands, the Conservancy partnered with the UC Berkeley Range Ecology Lab. Together we developed an “unofficial” ecological site classification based on top soils and topography at 57 study plots situated across the grassland landscape. Floristic surveys at the plots over five years informed models of inter-annual change for each ecological site. In 2013, the Conservancy incorporated our findings into an extensive adaptive management plan, and in 2014, NRCS ESD specialists joined the partnership. Now we are working together to develop grazing trials to inform adaptive management, modify the models for wider interpretation, and provide baseline data for official Ecological Site Descriptions for the Tejon Ranch area.