Effect of grazing on soil-water content in semiarid rangelands of southeast Idaho
This papers shows that soils under a grazing method called “simulated holistic planned grazing” have the highest percent volumetric-water content of soils tested under three different grazing methodologies that also included “rest-rotation”, and “total rest”. Although this study was a simulation, it demonstrates the potential for soils managed with Holistic Planned Grazing to increase their water-holding capacity.
Managing the grazing landscape: Insights for agricultural adaptation from a mid-drought photo-elicitation study in the Australian sheep-wheat belt
This paper compares the landscape perceptions of HM graziers with those of more conventional graziers. HM graziers described their use of adaptive farm management techniques to gain outcomes for production and ecosystems alike, demonstrating a system-based understanding of their farms conducive to farming successfully under increased climate variability.
Sustainability of holistic and conventional cattle ranching in the seasonally dry tropics of Chiapas, Mexico, Decision Making
Eighteen (18) conventional and seven (7) holistic, dual-purpose ranches were studied using three sets of sustainability metrics combining economic, social, technological, and environmental indicators. Holistic ranchers have more pasture divisions, higher grazing pressure, greater lengths of time between pasture burns, greater milk productivity, larger forest reserves, lower cow and calf mortality, purchase less hay and feed, and use less herbicides and pesticides than their conventional neighbors, with holistic ranches demonstrating superiority for nine of ten indicators. Higher soil respiration, deeper topsoil, increased earthworm presence, more tightly closed herbaceous canopies, and marginally greater forage availability were found in holistic ranches, suggesting that holistic management strategies are leading to greater ecological and economic sustainability.
Impacts of soil carbon sequestration on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions in Midwestern USA beef finishing systems
This paper does a greenhouse gas life cycle analysis (LCA) comparison of two grazing finishing systems in the Upper Midwest, USA: feedlot finishing and Holistic Planned Grazing, which the authors refer to as adaptive multipaddock (AMP). It finds that AMP finishing improved soil organic carbon by 3.5 tons per hectare per year. This resulted in a net negative footprint of 6.6 kg of carbon dioxide equivalence per kg of carcass-weight.
Adaptive multi-paddock grazing enhances soil carbon and nitrogen stocks and stabilization through mineral association in southeastern U.S. grazing lands
This paper conducted a large-scale on-farm study on five “across the fence” pairs of Holistic Planned Grazing, referred to by the authors as adaptive multi-paddock (AMP) grazing, and conventional grazing (CG) grasslands covering a spectrum of southeast United States grazing lands. Findings showed that the AMP grazing sites had on average 13% (i.e., 9 Mg C ha−1) more soil C and 9% (i.e., 1 Mg N ha−1) more soil N compared to the CG sites over a 1 m depth. Additionally, the stocks’ difference was mostly in the mineral-associated organic matter fraction in the A-horizon, suggesting long-term persistence of soil C in AMP grazing farms.
The Effect of Grazing Regime on Grassland Bird Abundance in New York State
This paper quantified and compared bird abundances on pastures that were subject to continuous grazing, minimal rotation, or Holistic Management. Holistic resource managed pastures had 1.5 and 4.5 times higher average abundances of obligate grassland birds than minimally rotated or continuously grazed pastures, respectively.
The role of ruminants in reducing agriculture’s carbon footprint in North America
This paper determined that properly-managed grazing, if applied on 25% of our crop and grasslands, would mitigate the entire carbon footprint of North American agriculture. Better management of cropping and grazing practices in North America could draw down and sequester in soil 1.2 gigatons of carbon annually, equivalent to about 10% of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions.
Tall Fescue Management in the Piedmont: Sequestration of Soil Organic Carbon and Total Nitrogen
Grazing is shown to be superior to haying for organic C and N sequestration. Sequestration rates of 1.51 Mg C ha−1 yr−1 and 0.126 Mg N ha−1 yr−1 were measured during managed grazing of tall fescue over a period of 8 years on land in the southeastern United States that had previously been degraded via haying.
