ABSTRACT
The concept of a range site as an ecological or management entity based on climax plant communities was transferred from forestlands to rangelands during the 1930s and 1940s. Range condition and trend data provide a basis for adjusting present grazing management to facilitate or foster secondary plant succession. Range condition judges the present plant community compared to the climax for the site. Many ecologists and some range scientists reject the concept of climax vegetation. They deny that there is any one “end point” of succession, any steady state, any stable plant community in dynamic equilibrium with its environment. The primary source of plant community information in the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) is from productivity and composition data collected over many years in the normal course of field activities and from special studies. The SCS and Bureau of Land Management’s range data bases will provide much information useful in identifying, describing, and refining descriptions of climax plant communities.
