Guiding principles for using satellite-derived maps in rangeland management

Managing an arid ranch in the 21st century: New technologies for novel ecosystems

“…Fractional cover and production maps provide information across the Jornada and back in time, albeit at the plant functional group level (e.g., perennial grasses and forbs) and with limitations in accuracy inherent to satellite-based data. 8 With the benefit of field data, we have been able to quantify errors locally and we understand the nature of these errors. For example, we have found that satellite-based tools tend to underestimate vegetation production in more productive years.…”

“…Digital technologies allow managers to perceive and react to rangeland ecosystems in ways that were unimaginable a few decades ago. Tools include standardized field ecosystem monitoring databases 7 ; web-accessible maps of vegetation dynamics, 8 production forecasts, 9 and climate risk 10 ; sensor networks, 11 virtual fencing, 12 and associated dashboards; mobile applications to collect and access a variety of data 13 ; and new models, 14 interpretive tools, 15 and tool libraries. 16 Together,these tools allow for site-specific and rapidly reactive—even proactive—management.…”

Grassland intactness outcompetes species as a more efficient surrogate in conservation design

“…By targeting intact landscapes this approach is inherently threat‐based, and assumes that managing biome‐level threats (e.g., conifer expansion among rangelands) propagates benefits to species of conservation concern (Roberts et al, 2022). In practice, a defend the core strategy has been adopted by practitioners to manage the detrimental effects of invasive annual grass expansion (Allred et al, 2022; Creutzburg et al, 2022) and large wildfires (Maestas, Smith, et al, 2022), yet remains largely untested as an effective surrogate for encompassing the requirements of species underlying biome‐specific strategies.…”

Effects of Annual Weather Variation on Peak Herbaceous Yield Date in Sagebrush Steppe

“…Such information would be useful for adjusting the timing and duration of livestock grazing treatments that are consistent with meeting resource management objectives. Long-term yield data and updated information on weather-yield interactions can augment and complement current and future remote sensing efforts for tracking rangeland productivity and vegetation dynamics (Elmendorf et al 2015, Jones et al 2018, Allred et al 2022, Poděbradská et al 2022).…”