Patch-Burn Grazing Research Team

Go to this research team's website

Purpose

This research team explores approaches to the restoration of native grasslands and associated biodiversity within a working landscape. The target is a system based on grazing and recreational land use that is both ecologically and economically viable, as well as socially acceptable.

The goal of the Patch-Burn Grazing Research Team: 

• to test the use of patch-burn grazing and compare this to traditional grazing or the use of fire without grazing.

The group will

• Focus on plant-herbivore interactions and the disturbance patterns created by the fire-grazing interaction that alters livestock selectivity and competitive relationships among plants
• Examine the responses of insects and songbirds to these different management approaches
• Work with local landowners to examine their perspectives on the use of fire and grazing as management tools in Iowa grasslands and Oak Savannas

Research team resources

• Iowa Learning Farms webinar by Ryan Harr - Dec. 14 2011
• Watch videos about this team's work
• See a slideshow about this team's work

Related grant projects

• The complex role of tall fescue in grassland ecology (E2012-01)
• Quantifying eastern red cedar (Juniperus virginiana) in southern Iowa: A starting point for conversations with landowners about threats to grassland resilience (E2011-13)
• Increasing carbon sequestration of working prairie by reducing invasive species in a fire and grazing system (E2010-16)
• The Landowner's Decision: Grazing and fire as management tools on Iowa grasslands and oak savannahs (E2007-05)
• Devising a framework for implementing cattle-grazing, fire on grassland in southern Iowa (2006-E18)

More information, research and profiles of team members can be found on the Patch-Burn Grazing Research Team website.