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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Logan, Utah » Forage and Range Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #367957
Research Project: Improved Plant Genetic Resources and Methodologies for Rangelands, Pastures, and Turf Landscapes in the Semiarid Western U.S.

Location: Forage and Range Research

Title: Productivity, stability, and resilience of cool-season perennial grasses used for rangeland revegetation

Author
item Robins, Joseph
item Waldron, Blair
item Jensen, Kevin

Submitted to: Agrosystems, Geosciences & Environment
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 11/20/2019
Publication Date: 2/13/2020
Citation: Robins, J.G., Waldron, B.L., Jensen, K.B. 2020. Productivity, stability, and resilience of cool-season perennial grasses used for rangeland revegetation. Agrosystems, Geosciences & Environment. 3(1). https://doi.org/10.1002/agg2.20002.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/agg2.20002

Interpretive Summary: Thirteen cool-season grass species were evaluated for biomass and ground cover at six locations from 2000 to 2004. Intermediate, tall, and crested wheatgrasses proved to be the most productive (greatest yearly average performance) and stable (least yearly performance variability). Basin wildrye, thickspike wheatgrass, and bluebunch were the least productive and stable. The species had similar levels of resilience (ratio of least productive year to productivity), and this measure was relatively unimportant. This was a preliminary analysis of these measures on rangeland grass species, but supported previous results concerning these species.

Technical Abstract: An analysis of biomass and ground cover data collected from six rangeland sites in the Intermountain and Northern Great Plains areas of the U.S. from 2000 to 2004 was undertaken to characterize the productivity, stability, and resilience of cool-season perennial grass species. Among the 13 included species, and the 48 cultivars, intermediate wheatgrass, tall wheatgrass, and to a lesser extent crested wheatgrass possessed the greatest biomass and ground cover productivity. Basin wildrye, thickspike wheatgrass, and bluebunch wheatgrass possessed the lower biomass productivity and stability. There were no differences among species or cultivar for biomass resilience and differences for ground cover resilience were limited. Overall, these three statistics provide an interesting commparison among rangeland species, but more long-term datasets with greater inferences are necessary to more definitive conclusions.