Do I Have a Rangeland Resource Concern?

By Toni M. Flax, Rangeland Management Specialist
Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS)
Stockton, Kansas

Most conservation programs require a resource concern be addressed to be eligible for cost share. So what are resource concerns and what can be done to address them? For rangeland, there are several concerns and endless options.

With rangelands many resource concerns can be symptoms of the biggest problem: range condition. This is the percentage of what plants are in the field today in comparison to climax plant community or what was here before European settlement. For most programs this needs to be less than 65 percent and in a downward trend to be eligible. Many rangelands today fall into this category. Most all of the options for other concerns will ultimately improve range condition.

Grazing Distribution – where parts of a field are grazed differently than others. This could be due to many reasons. Here are some questions to think about. What are the range sites or how much difference is there in soils in your pastures? Where is the water located? Is the field rough? What is the size and shape of the field? Grazing distribution can be addressed in several ways including cross fencing, movement of salt and minerals, herding, patch burning, and water source placement, just to name a few.

For lack of water or poor water quality, installing a pipeline and tank(s) system is always a good option. Others would be fencing out streams and allowing limited access points, putting a pipe through a pond dam into a tank then fencing out the pond, possibly even putting in a spring development.

Are trees and brush taking over? Many programs are specific about the species of trees and brush and how much of the surface is covered by the canopy of the target species. A few species of concern are Eastern Red Cedar, Honey Locust, and Smooth Sumac. These can be addressed with a variety of options such as prescribed burning, spraying, and mechanical removal.

Remember there is never one answer for addressing a resource concern; there are many options. This is by far not an all-inclusive list, just some ideas to help you get started thinking about what concerns you may have.

All conservation programs require a written conservation plan that can be requested to be done at any time. It is best to have a conservation plan completed before and not during a program sign up so there is time to thoroughly look over the operation and recognize all the resource concerns so the best program can be identified to address those concerns. The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) provides assistance in writing conservation plans that includes identifying resource concerns, forage inventories, and stocking rate determinations so that you can make the most informed decisions.

If you suspect you might have a resource concern and would like assistance in addressing it, please contact your local NRCS office or conservation district office located at your local county USDA Service Center.

For more information about NRCS programs, visit the Kansas NRCS Web site at www.ks.nrcs.usda.gov.

This article is also available in Microsoft Word format.

Do I Have a Rangeland Concern? (DOC; 50 KB)

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Last Modified: 12/09/2008