ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the effects of grazing on rangeland vegetation. Managers and range technicians estimate and measure forage utilization to determine when the correct degree of grazing has occurred, to indicate the amount of forage that remains to be harvested, and to ascertain the extent of livestock distribution problems. A distinction is made between stocking, which is a daily phenomenon; range forage utilization, which is seasonal; and grazing, which has a longer time reference. If grazing is light or moderate, many individual plants or plant parts are ungrazed, and a random sample of the number of ungrazed and grazed plants and the weight of each permits measurement of utilization without protection of plots. Utilization measurements can indicate effects of different intensities of grazing. Techniques of evaluating rangeland forage utilization, finding standards for proper rangeland forage use, and techniques for obtaining proper grazing management constitute a large part of Range Management.
