LCC News
Field Day at Mountain Research Station
Field Day at Mountain Research Station
Native grasses win performance tests
Recent research shows integrating native grasses into grazing lands can be a good option for beef producers.
A literature review conducted by the University of Tennessee and funded by USDA found strong evidence that using native warm-season grasses caused steers to gain more weight per day and yield more beef per acre, compared with non-native grasses like tall fescue and bermudagrass.
The Dynamic Darters: A Private Lands Conservation Success Story
After a rigorous scientific study by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), researchers have found that populations of the tiny, freshwater fish are rebounding after years of decline.
TN Workshop - Native grasses in Prescribed Grazing Systems
IN Workshop - Native grasses in Prescribed Grazing Systems
OH Workshop - Using Native Warm-Season Grasses in a Grazing System
Third Thursday Web Forum: Updates and applications of USGS Gap Analysis Project data
In this webinar, Nathan will provide an update on the current and future direction of the GAP program. In addition to providing a database of protected areas and high resolution land cover data, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Gap Analysis Project (GAP) recently released range and habitat distribution data for 1,590 terrestrial vertebrate species within the lower 48 states. Whereas the primary mission of GAP is to assess how well species are protected, the data have additional utility for broad-scale conservation assessments and planning exercises, as well as for the development of new methods for landscape assessment and characterization.
Efforts are underway to harness recent species occurrence data for updates to GAP range data. Recent applications of GAP habitat maps have included a study that explored the potential impacts of demand for wood pellets on wildlife in the Southeast and another that identified which wildlife species could have the greatest exposure to degradation of southeastern woody wetlands. The data have also provided opportunities to explore scale-sensitivities in gap analyses and develop ways to incorporate measures of spatial patterns in habitat for multiple species into conservation plans.
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Climate and Conservation Coffee
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Greg Judy Talks Electric Fencing and Gates for Sheep and Cattle
In this 3:30 video, we visit the fence I built in 1999 that is still functioning as sheep pasture. It uses 4 strands of high-tensile, 12 guage, 180,000 psi wire set at 7, 13, 19, and 30 inches so that it can keep in goats, sheep and guardian dogs. Our posts are 4 foot high, 5/8″ fiberglass posts spaced at 25 feet. Our corners don’t have braces. Instead we pounded our long posts deeper into the ground so they have the leverage to hold the fence tight. You’ll also see the sheep grazing seedheads off fescue, bluegrass, and orchardgrass, encouraging the grasses to put out new leaves.
Ag a perfect place to 'do science' (Editorial)
So often, it’s how something is said that makes more of an impression than what is said. That appears to be the case in encouraging young students to consider careers in science, according to a recent psychology study from New York University and Princeton University.
Over the course of a school year, researchers found that elementary school children lose confidence that they can “be scientists,” but remain more confident that they can “do science.”
While you scratch your head and ask, “What’s the difference?” know that it comes down to what Marjorie Rhodes, an associate professor in NYU’s department of psychology and the senior author of the study, called action-focused language versus identity focused language. The kids cast a wider net over who can be involved science than who they deem to be scientists.
How the South Fights Fire with Fire, and What the West Can Learn
It was a superb Spring day in the mountains of west Georgia, with bluebird skies and a light breeze through the longleaf pines, when a helicopter rained fire from the sky.
A machine on the side of the helicopter was dropping thousands of ping pong ball shaped incendiary devices as it criss-crossed a mix of mature, longleaf pine trees, some mature oaks and the grasses left from a timber company clearcut. When the balls hit the grass, fire bloomed in a deep orange that turned into rings of flame enclosing scorched vegetation.
As the flames crept, a pair of firefighters waited for just the right moment to zoom up a gravel road on ATVs fitted with flamethrowers. When they did, they set fire to grass at the edge of the road, robbing the main blaze of fuel and stopping it dead. It was all a part of Nathan Klaus' plan.
SEPARC 2013 Annual Meeting
2013 Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists
