Impact of cattle night corralling on soil properties and vegetation in the semiarid degraded rangeland of Ethiopia

In Ethiopia, rangeland degradation is a severe environmental problem. To improve rangeland vegetation cover and support the rangeland-based livelihoods, it is imperative to repair degraded rangeland using different rehabilitative measures. This study was carried out to evaluate the effects of night cattle corralling impact on soil chemical parameters, herbaceous species compositions and biomass yield of degraded rangeland.  To conduct the experiment, severely degraded (SD) and moderately degraded (MD) rangelands with an area size of 30m x10m (300m2) each was identified. Then, each of the selected rangeland types was separated into two paddocks with an area size of 10m x 15m (150 m2). The treatment paddocks of the severely and moderately degraded rangeland were treated by cattle impact tools corralling cattle every night in the paddock for one month (SDT1 and MDT1). While the second paddock in both rangeland types was used as a control without cattle impact tools (SDT2 and MDT2). A randomized complete block design was used and each treatment was replicated three times. The results showed that soil chemical parameters and herbaceous species compositions in both degraded rangeland paddocks treated with cattle impact tools (SDT1 and MDT1) changed significantly (p&lt;0.05) than paddocks without cattle impact tools (SDT2 and MDT2). Likewise, there was an increased difference (p&lt;0.05) in biomass yields of 2.98 ton/ha and 5.35ton/ha from severely and moderately degraded rangeland, respectively for paddocks treated with cattle impact tools (SDT1 and MDT2), compared to paddocks of biomass yield of 0.98 ton/ha and 2.78 ton/ha without cattle impact tools treatments for SDT2 and MDT2 respectively. Thus the result from this study emphasized the advantage of night cattle corralling impact tools for improved soil parameters and herbaceous species compositions of degraded rangeland. Hence, we concluded that employing cattle impact tools to restore degraded rangeland significantly improved soil physico-chemical properties, with ultimate effect on vegetation cover, vegetation compositions and herbaceous biomass yield, attributed from soil seed bank growth. Bangladesh Journal of Animal Science 51 (4): 152-162</jats:p

Biomass production of different grass species available at irrigated lowland of Dassench Woreda in South Western Ethiopia

On farm adaptability test of different grass species was conducted on pastoral area of Keelewe peasant association in Dassench Woreda of South Omo Zone in 2016 under irrigated condition with the objective to identify high biomass yielding grass species. The field experiment was laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design with four replicates per tested species. The tested grass species were Chloris gayana, Cenchrus ciliaris and Panicum colaratum. The result indicated that there was a significant difference (p&gt;0.05) among the tested grass species. Panicum colaratum yields the highest (18.08 t/ha) than the Chloris gayana (15.21 t/ha) whereas, Cenchrus ciliaris had yielded the lowest dry matter yield (11.20t/ha) than Chloris gayana and Panicum colaratum. The Panicum colaratum was one with maximum dry matter yield being recommended for irrigated conditions in the study area. However, further testing is required on feeding value, dry matter yield under different fertilizer dose, stem height, leaf to stem ratio, irrigation requirements and chemical composition of tested grass species.Bang. J. Anim. Sci. 2017. 46 (3): 188-191</jats:p