ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that pastoral strategies, space-use efficiency, and their relationship with dominant vegetation patterns are compared in three Andean systems: alpacas and llamas in the punas of the Ulla-Ulla altiplano, ovines in high-altitude grasslands of the Cumbres Calchaquies, and cattle in the páramos of the Cordillera de Merida. The introduction of new plant and animal species and the implementation of new technologies had a variety of impacts on the environment and on traditional land use practices. One of the consequences was the change in traditional grazing patterns, which had developed during the millennia of interactions of human populations with mountain environments. Animal movement between vegetation belts is strongly linked to the agricultural calendar. In the Ulla-Ulla altiplano, a more limited pastoral space for alpacas can be explained by their requirement for tender and green fodder, which can only be found in the bofedales.
