Rangeland Ecology & Management
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- Library Collection Record
1 Savanna
Savannas are characterized by the coexistence of trees and grasses and occur largely in the seasonal tropics between the equatorial rainforests and mid-latitude desert ecosystems. This article…Publication Date 2008- climate change
- Deciduous
- Evergreen
- fire
- grazing
- herbivory
- phenology
- Seasonal tropics
- soils
- Tree and grass competition
- savanna
- ecology
- animal impact
- grasslands
- rainfall
- southern Africa
- Library Collection RecordSummary Grasslands are located in areas with precipitation ranging between 150 and 1200 mm yr-1 and temperature between 0 and 25 C (Lieth and Whittaker, 1975). Along a precipitation gradient, in…Publication Date 2001
- grasslands
- rainfall
- ecosystem ecology
- southern Africa
- Library Collection RecordIn the Sahel and the Kalahari, the growth in groundwater extraction via simple wells and boreholes is contributing to an increased use of dryland natural resources, to competition for resources, and…Publication Date 2003
- rangeland condition
- rainfall
- groundwater
- animal production
- vegetation dynamics
- biodiversity
- bush thickening
- indigenous encroaching species
- southern Africa
- Library Collection RecordSummary * 1Grasses using the C4 photosynthetic pathway dominate today's savanna ecosystems and account for ~20% of terrestrial carbon fixation. However, this dominant status was reached only…Publication Date 2008
- atmospheric CO2
- C4 plants
- climate change
- fire
- grasslands
- grazing
- Poaceae
- rainfall
- savanna
- seasonality
- carbon dioxide
- palaeoclimate
- palaeobotany
- Africa
- Library Collection Record[1] Land use/cover change has been recognized as a key component in global change. Various land cover data sets, including historically reconstructed, recently observed, and future projected, have…Publication Date 2007
- land use
- climate change
- management
- classification
- data analysis
- remote sensing
- modelling
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordIt has been well established that drought frequently emerges in several tropical regions following the onset of El Niño. An important characteristic of such droughts is their spatial extent, which…Publication Date 2006
- drought
- climate change
- El Nino
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordIn Kenya, lands surrounding wildlife protected areas (PAs), referred to as dispersal areas, have undergone widespread land use changes, but these have been little studied. This study investigated…Publication Date 2008
- conservation
- agriculture
- national parks
- land use
- grazing
- biodiversity
- disturbance
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordDegradation in arid and semi-arid regions can be ascribed primarily to environmental conditions such as extreme changes in temperature and erratic rainfall patterns. Seed germination and seedling…Publication Date 2006
- Drought Stress
- polyethylene glycol (PEG)
- restoration
- rangelands
- seeds
- germination
- grasslands
- rainfall
- climate
- drought
- plant autecology
- restoration ecology
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe response of photosynthetic activity to interannual rainfall variations in Africa South of the Sahara is examined using 20 years (1981-2000) of Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) AVHRR…Publication Date 2007
- NDVI
- vegetation
- rainfall
- Land cover
- soil properties
- Interannual variability
- Africa
- remote sensing
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordEarly warning systems (EWS) tend to focus on the identification of slow onset disasters such famine and epidemic disease. Since hazardous environmental conditions often precede disastrous outcomes by…Publication Date 2006
- Early warning
- Africa
- food security
- NDVI
- precipitation
- rainfall
- Malaria
- Rift valley fever
- Pastoral livelihoods
- modelling
- drought
- management
- system ecology
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordSavanna ecosystems of southern Africa are strongly influenced by water availability and fire intensity, and this study aimed to show whether these two specific environmental variables are reflected…Publication Date 2008
- calibration
- Kruger National Park
- fire history
- quantitative analysis
- Relevant Source Area of Charcoal
- fire ecology
- palaeobotany
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe tree-grass interactions of African savannas are mainly determined by varying rainfall patterns and soil fertility. Large savanna trees are known to modify soil nutrient conditions, but whether…Publication Date 2007
- canopy
- Fibre content
- Grass structure
- grazing
- nitrogen
- phosphorus
- savanna
- rainfall
- soil fertility
- plant production
- nutrition
- soil organic carbon
- biomass
- forage quality
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe coexistence of woody and grassy plants in savannas has often been attributed to a rooting-niche separation (two-layer hypothesis). Water was assumed to be the limiting resource for both growth…Publication Date 2006
- fire
- grazing
- Honeycomb rippling model
- Inter-tree competition
- Spatio-temporal rainfall variation
- Tree-grass coexistence
- savanna
- indigenous encroaching species
- grasslands
- soil moisture
- rainfall
- vegetation dynamics
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordSummary Robust calibration of hydrological models, driven by gridded precipitation data derived from either Regional Climate Models or statistical downscaling of General Circulation Models, is…Publication Date 2008
- groundwater
- recharge
- precipitation
- distribution
- Africa
- rainfall
- hydrology
- climate change
- soil moisture
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordWe are attempting to set up a new protocol for palaeoecological reconstruction in relation to the fossil hominin site Laetoli, Tanzania. This is based on the premise that habitat variability in the…Publication Date 2008
- Habitat variability
- rainfall
- climate
- topography
- soil
- Hominins
- ecology
- paleoecology
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordNamibian rangelands are encroached with Acacia mellifera, partially resulting from a poor understanding of vegetation dynamics. A conceptual state-and-transition model of vegetation dynamics in the…Publication Date 2008
- fire
- hazards
- management
- opportunities
- state-and-transition
- savanna
- indigenous encroaching species
- bush thickening
- rainfall
- seed banks
- vegetation dynamics
- plant autecology
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThis paper provides a reappraisal of contemporary perspectives on climate change in southern Africa's Okavango Delta sub-region by drawing on time-line evidence from historical/archival records…Publication Date 2008
- Bush-encroachment
- desiccation
- deterioration
- Human interventions
- wetland
- climate change
- remote sensing
- hydrology
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordDespite the ubiquity of sub-tropical savannas throughout the earth, limitations of savanna productivity are understudied relative to other terrestrial systems. The limitations of savanna productivity…Publication Date 2008
- grass
- nitrogen
- phosphorus
- savanna
- rainfall
- soil nutrients
- plant production
- plant autecology
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe Kalahari sand sheet, with a 2.5-million ha area, is probably the largest continuous surface of sand in the world. The Kalahari Transect (KT) is one of a set of IGBP 'megatransects '…Publication Date 2007
- biogeochemistry
- Hydraulic properties
- Kalahari transect
- Sand deposits
- stable isotopes
- ecosystem dynamics
- vegetation dynamics
- soil organic carbon
- Soil Condition
- soil nutrients
- rainfall
- grasslands
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordBiodiversity is a critical component of the natural environment and the protection of it often meant the displacement of local communities in developing countries. The Richtersveld National Park (…Publication Date 2007
- rangelands
- conservation
- Population crashes
- Herd recovery
- goats
- biodiversity
- socio-economic aspects
- national parks
- sheep
- pastoralism
- land use
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe phenology of three dominant and economically important tree species; Acacia erioloba, Acacia luederitzii and Acacia mellifera, all widespread in the Kalahari in Botswana, was studied at Tsabong (…Publication Date 2007
- Kalahari
- phenology
- Acacia luederitzii
- Acacia erioloba
- Acacia mellifera
- litter
- plant autecology
- climate change
- rainfall
- fodder production
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordA national-level land degradation risk monitoring system identified an important grazing area in central northern Namibia as an area at risk of environmental change. A time series analysis of primary…Publication Date 2007
- semi-arid
- local knowledge
- rainfall variability
- water supply
- grazing
- land management
- degradation
- data analysis
- grasslands
- livestock
- rainfall
- participatory rural appraisal
- decision support systems
- management
- traditional knowledge
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordWe investigated the effects of rainfall and the number of animals on changes in vegetation and on the output of milk and meat from the communal areas of Namaqualand. Previously published short- and…Publication Date 2007
- climate change
- degradation
- desert
- Karoo
- livestock production
- Disequilibrium
- sustainability
- animal nutrition
- rainfall
- pastoralism
- subsistence agriculture
- animal production
- management
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordAdvanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR), Normalized Difference Vegetation Index data (NDVI, 1 km2, 1985-2003) and modeled net primary production (NPP, 8 km2, 1981-2000) data were used to…Publication Date 2007
- monitoring
- AVHRR
- NDVI
- rain-use efficiency
- NPP
- Communal lands
- South Africa
- degradation
- land use
- remote sensing
- NDVI values
- mapping
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordDegradation in semi-arid Karoo rangelands has been ascribed to over-utilization by livestock and variations in rainfall regime. The understanding of vegetation dynamics in confined plant-herbivore…Publication Date 2006
- African wild herbivore
- Herbivore exclosure
- plant functional type
- Protected area
- vegetation monitoring
- rangelands
- rangeland condition
- vegetation dynamics
- livestock
- grazing
- land use
- national parks
- rainfall
- monitoring
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordMany mechanisms have been suggested to explain the coexistence of woody species and grasses in savannas, yet, evidence from field studies and simulation models has been mixed. Shrub encroachment is…Publication Date 2007
- Patch-dynamics
- Cyclical succession
- shrub encroachment
- Spatially explicit root growth
- Computer simulation model
- Validation
- Latin Hypercube sensitivity analysis
- Acacia mellifera
- savanna
- indigenous encroaching species
- vegetation dynamics
- ecosystem ecology
- modelling
- rainfall
- fire
- soil moisture
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordIn semiarid savannas of Southern Africa current land use practices and climate change may lead to substantial changes of vegetation structure in the near future, however uncertainty remains about the…Publication Date 2006
- Acacia erioloba
- Bush encroachment
- global change
- Grewia flava
- overgrazing
- seed dispersal
- shrub encroachment
- Southern Kalahari
- Spatial-explicit simulation model
- savanna
- land use
- grazing
- climate change
- vegetation dynamics
- cattle
- ecosystem ecology
- ecosystem dynamics
- rainfall
- fire ecology
- modelling
- conservation
- management
- carrying capacity
- biodiversity
- indigenous encroaching species
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordUnlike any other biome, savannas consist of both trees and grasses in a persistent and equitable manner. This unique mixture of two different life forms attracted scientific scrutiny for decades.…Publication Date 2006
- Terminalia sericea
- Shallow root system
- savannas
- rainfall
- Etosha National Park
- grazing
- indigenous encroaching species
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThis paper forms part of a long-term study of land degradation in the Klein Seekoei valley in the Sneeuberg uplands about 30 km southwest of the town of Middelburg, South Africa (Fig. 1). Landscape…Publication Date 2006
- erosion
- Karoo
- rainfall intensity
- Stock numbers
- land degradation
- Gullies
- rainfall
- degradation
- rangeland condition
- rangelands
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordConserving African wildlife in human-occupied landscapes requires management intervention that is guided by a mechanistic understanding of how anthropogenic factors influence large-scale ecological…Publication Date 2007
- wildlife
- rainfall
- predation
- competition
- apparent competition
- Non-protected area
- management
- conservation
- grasslands
- eco - tourism
- cattle
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThis series of two papers describes a mechanistic model that simulates within years the productivity of vegetation and livestock on the communal semi-arid rangeland of the Succulent Karoo of South…Publication Date 2007
- semi-arid rangelands
- Mechanistic model
- plant growth
- diet selection
- food intake
- animal productivity
- rangeland condition
- rangelands
- plant production
- animal production
- communal farming
- livestock
- management
- soil moisture
- rainfall
- runoff
- modelling
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe worldwide loss of utilisable rangeland in (semi-) arid areas results in huge economic and social costs. Only adaptive management strategies are able to cope with these systems, which are mainly…Publication Date 2007
- Non-equilibrium system
- grazing
- Opportunistic management
- Resting
- semi-arid
- simulation model
- rangeland condition
- rangelands
- modelling
- Economic Aspects
- management
- rainfall
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordLivestock production systems in Africa are experiencing rapid changes in structure and function due to increased demands for livestock products from a more prosperous and ever-increasing human…Publication Date 2008
- Methane
- livestock systems
- Livestock Populations
- climate change
- IPCC
- Africa
- cattle
- sheep
- goats
- greenhouse gases
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordLarge herbivores can both positively and negatively affect primary productivity and rates of nutrient cycling in different ecosystems. Positive effects of grazers in grasslands have been attributed…Publication Date 2006
- livestock
- soil fertility
- rainfall
- ecosystem processes
- savanna
- productivity
- soil fertility
- cattle
- migration
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordOne of the many contentious issues facing the appropriate and accurate assessment of land degradation is the varying emphasis placed on vegetation degradation and soil degradation processes. This has…Publication Date 2006
- vegetation degradation
- soil degradation
- remote sensing
- land use
- Land cover
- Tanzania
- degradation
- Soil Condition
- mapping
- rainfall
- management
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordRiver salination due to dryland agriculture was studied between 1985 and 1986 in the 150-km2 large catchment of the Sandspruit river, a tributary of the Berg river in the semi-arid Western Cape…Publication Date 1995
- agriculture
- hydrology
- rainfall
- modelling
- soils
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordAbstract not avaiable.Publication Date 2011
- biodiversity
- climate change
- global warming
- rainfall
- Nigeria
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordClimate change is possibly the most highly profiled scientific issue of our time. The projected changes in temperature and rainfall are substantial, as will be the associated impacts on biodiversity…Publication Date 2010
- climate change
- temperature
- rainfall
- biodiversity
- agriculture
- carbon dioxide
- policy
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordThere are few tests of the predicted decline of secondary productivity in desertified rangelands, despite this being one of the major concerns around desertification. Subtropical thicket, largely…Publication Date 2009
- body growth
- fleece production
- rangelands
- veld degradation
- animal production
- goats
- degradation
- rainfall
- management
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordThis study examined intraspecific variation in mineral composition and rumen degradability of Atriplex nummularia plants and the influence on selection preferences of sheep. Individual plants were…Publication Date 2009
- forage quality
- in situ degradability
- intraspecific variation
- salt bush
- sheep
- nutrition
- diet selection
- forage quality
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordPrimary energy extraction patterns by livestock under agropastoralism and ranching were investigated by the bite count method in semiarid south-eastern Kenya. Sward biomass for optimal energy intake…Publication Date 2009
- agropastoralism
- energy intake
- ranching
- livestock
- cattle
- sheep
- goats
- pastoralism
- diet selection
- grazing
- management
- animal production
- Kenya
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe nutritive value of four subtropical grasses (Panicum maximum, Anthephora pubescens, Digitaria eriantha and Chloris gayana) standing hay were compared in terms of qualitative intake and partial…Publication Date 2009
- Anthephora pubescens
- Chloris gayana
- Digitaria eriantha
- nutritive value
- Panicum maximum
- diet selection
- sheep
- forage quality
- animal nutrition
- grazing
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordBush encroachment has been recognised in southern Africa since the late nineteenth century. Our review of 23 studies showed that the rate of woody cover change has ranged from ?0.131 to 1.275% y?1.…Publication Date 2014
- Bush encroachment
- ecosystem ecology
- grazing
- fire
- rainfall
- grasses
- carbon dioxide
- climate change
- management
- southern Africa
- Library Collection RecordWoody plant encroachment is frequent in dry savannas. Grazing is often considered to be a major cause of encroachment in dry savannas because grasses are removed by livestock, leaving bare areas for…Publication Date 2014
- Bush encroachment
- savanna
- grazing
- fire
- rainfall
- climate change
- management
- Kimberley area
- Northern Cape
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordThis paper reports on diet selection of goats offered six browse species (i.e. Acacia natalitia [Vachellia natalitia], Acacia nilotica [Vachellia nilotica], Dichrostachys cinerea, Grewia occidentalis…Publication Date 2014
- foraging ecology
- goats
- animal nutrition
- diet selection
- rainfall
- Zululand thornveld
- KwaZulu-Natal
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordAn online decision support system derived from research and expert knowledge was developed for arid rangeland management in central Namibia. The expert system emphasises the control of bush…Publication Date 2014
- Bush encroachment
- decision support systems
- rangeland management
- rainfall
- savanna
- restoration ecology
- photographs
- Namibia
- Africa
- Library Collection RecordBrowsing herbivores are generally highly selective feeders, selecting for new shoots and young plant material. Determinations of browser carrying capacity are then greatly inflated when based on…Publication Date 2014
- savanna
- browsing
- grazing
- game
- wildlife
- conservation
- carrying capacity
- climate
- soil
- rainfall
- modelling
- plant production
- management
- Zululand region
- KwaZulu-Natal
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordWith the rapid expansion of wildlife ranching and conservation in South African savannas and the resultant increase in multi-species grazing and browsing systems, information on browse production…Publication Date 2014
- savanna
- browsing
- grazing
- game
- wildlife
- conservation
- carrying capacity
- climate
- soil
- rainfall
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordThe quality of the landscape is declining in many grassland and savanna areas of Africa as a consequence of woody plant encroachment. We investigated the changes in vegetation at selected sites on…Publication Date 2014
- Vegetation Change
- grasslands
- savanna
- degradation
- Bush encroachment
- land use
- soils
- rainfall
- temperature
- climate change
- carbon dioxide
- KwaZulu-Natal
- South Africa
- Library Collection RecordWildfires can have significant impacts on rangeland productivity and functionality causing substantial economic losses to affected farmers. In August 2011, such wildfires swept through the North West…Publication Date 2013
- fire ecology
- rangelands
- plant production
- management
- grazing
- socio-economic aspects
- biodiversity
- savanna
- rainfall
- grazing capacity
- erosion
- ecosystem ecology
- soil nutrients
- South Africa