RRSR Highlights

• Explore livestock performance and production data from some of the longest running grazing experiments in North America, now available through a curated digital open access program at the National Agricultural Library's Ag Data Commons!

• How do I make a drought plan?

Drought is inevitable. This handbook created by the Colorado Agricultural Drought Advisors team with help from USDA-ARS can help producers manage risks ahead of time.

• Grazing management for grassland bird habitat

This CSU Extension fact sheet shows how grazing management can support grassland bird habitat. It features co-produced research from ARS scientists and rangeland stakeholders in the Collaborative Adaptive Rangeland Management study at the Central Plains Experimental Range.

• Using long-term forecasts for stocking decisions podcast

EJ Raynor (USDA-ARS) and Retta Bruegger (Colorado State Extension) discuss an 80-year project on how long- and short-term climate and weather correlates to production on ranches, and a decision tree tool that can be used to make management decisions.

• What does resilience mean to western ranchers? 

This story map shows results from interviews and focus groups with livestock producers across the Western U.S.

• There is nothing simple about grazing cattle

  A study examined grazing pastures across the country using data analysis instead of traditional methods.

• University of Wyoming Extension

  The stocker steer quandary: the price slide.

• Northern Plains Climate Hub

  Select Accomplishments in FY21-Q2

• LTAR Network and USDA Climate Hubs are working to develop knowledge and technology for sound resource management via research and collaboration with stakeholders. The goal is to ensure sustained crop and livestock production and ecosystem services from agroecosystems, and to forecast and verify the effects of environmental changes, public policies, and emerging technologies.

  Plovers, prairie dogs, and fire:  Managing semi-arid rangelands for wildlife and livestock -Providing additional desirable plover habitat compatible with livestock production can be challenging. Better understanding how plover, prairie dogs, fire, and livestock interact may provide possible solutions.   

• Thunder Basin Flip the agriculture and natural resources research model. -An effort started in 2014 to flip the research model specifically for the Thunder Basin region.

• Prairie dogs -Keystone species or calamity?- Prairie dogs woven into Thunder Basin Grasslands ecosystem detrimental to ranching if too many, but too few and dependent wildlife disappear.  

• How many cows can 1 pasture handle? New tool for ranchers - Grass Cast is ready
• The Fabulous Five ride Again - summer interns

• New Grass-Cast Released --Now an innovative new Grassland Productivity Forecast or “Grass-Cast” has published its first forecast to help producers in the Northern Great Plains reduce this economically important source of uncertainty. For more information go to USDA Northern Plains Climate Hub’s website

• Dr. Lauren M. Porensky. Outstanding Young Range Professional Award from the Society for Range Management (SRM)
• Cover | Fire Ecology Journal Prescribed fire suppresses unpalatable annual grasses, improves forage quality, and enhances habitat for certain wildlife species in the shortgrass steppe at the Central Plains Experimental Range near Nunn, Colorado, USA

• Cowboys, Collaboration and Conservation - New CARM Blog

• Nice article on the CARM experiment at CPER (Balancing Beef Production with Biodiversity). https://agresearchmag.ars.usda.gov/2017/oct/biodiversity/

• Beef and Biodiversity – How Do We Get Both? The Agricultural Research Service (ARS) is working with ranchers and other partners on research that will tell us which grazing management gets us the most bang for our buck. Thanks to Jan Suszkiw, and the ARS’s AgMag for this article!