Not much of the northern mixed-grass prairie remains intact. Most has been cultivated, converted to pasture or developed. And most of what’s left is grazed at moderate intensity for beef production. We don’t know what this prairie would look like if it were managed to emulate pre-contact conditions, in which bison would have grazed it very intensively for short periods of time and then left it ungrazed for very long periods of time. With this experiment, we hope to find out.
OBJECTIVE:
The objective of this project is to answer the question: How does grazing intensity affect heterogeneity in the multi-scale structure and function of mixed-grass prairie communities?
We are doing this by manipulating the intensity of grazing by cattle on 9, 300 ha native grass fields created in Grasslands National Park of Canada. Using a modified Before-After-Control-Impact (“beyond BACI”) design, we will target grazing in the fields from 0% utilization (control) to 70% utilization. In each field we will then measure the response of the grassland community (flora and fauna) to the grazing treatment. If you want to learn more, we encourage you to read our study design (synopsis or complete text).
MAP OF STUDY AREA:
