Improving Forage Production Quantity and Quality Using Native Legume Species in Semi-Arid Agrosilvopastoral System

Agrosilvopastoral systems provide a range of livelihood services, either directly through forage production or indirectly by the beneficial effects on soil conservation, nutrient cycling, pollutant filtering, and biodiversity enhancement. Hence, improved silvopastoral systems have ample scope to rehabilitate degraded pastures to sustain livestock production, which remains a strong pillar for the livelihoods of the agrosilvopastoral communities. To evaluate the impact of Hedysarum coronarium L. (sulla) reseeding on pasture productivity, plant cover and plant density in semi-arid silvopastoral systems, an experiment was carried out in Sbaihia Site, Zaghouan Governorate, Tunisia during 2018-2019 growing season. The experiment was laid out under a randomized complete block design having 3 treatments including reseeding sulla; protection from grazing and control (free grazing) with three replications per treatment. Preliminary results showed that there were significant differences (p\u3c 0.05) among the three treatments. Reseeded sulla and protected plots recorded 100% plant cover while the control plots had less than 60%. The estimated biomass for the reseeded plots was four times higher than the biomass production in the protected plots and eleven times higher than the control plots. The highest plant density was recorded in the reseeded plots (163.2 plants/m2), followed by the protected plots (30.6 plants/m2) while the lowest value was recorded in the control plots (29.8 plants/m2). Based on these findings, it is concluded that reseeding well-adapted native forage species has a great potential to improve productivity of semi-arid silvopastoral systems, which would contribute towards reducing the feeding cost and, therefore, enhancing the income of the agrosilvopastoral communities

Natural Regeneration of Severely Degraded Terrestrial Arid Ecosystems Needs More Than Just Removing the Cause of the Degradation

Rangelands cover over 75% of Kuwait’s total land area. Most of these rangelands are severely degraded because of overgrazing, poor anthropic utilization, and mismanagement. Restoring natural rangelands is a way to increase forage productivity, enhance biodiversity, and achieve sustainable development. When degradation has not reached the point of irreversibility, natural restoration through resting is one of the best low-cost restoration techniques. This study evaluated the effect of natural restoration on vegetation cover and species richness in the desert rangelands of Kuwait. The studied rangeland was a completely fenced area of 1 km2. The percent of vegetation was measured using the line- intercept method. The cover of perennial species was the same in fenced and unfenced areas (0%), but annual species cover was 19.67% in fenced areas and 6% in unfenced areas. There was no significant difference in the contribution to the total cover of the dominant invasive species Stipa capensis between fenced (90%) and unfenced areas (83%). All recorded species are therophytes, which raises the disturbance index to 100%. This therophytization demonstrates an imbalance in the rangeland ecosystem and desertification due to the high anthropozoogene pressure. Under such a severely degraded ecosystem, natural restoration cannot restore vegetation. Reintroducing native species including Helianthemum lipii, Haloxylon salicornicum, Rhanterium epapposum, and Calligonum comosum, is required to restore the ecosystem, facilitate the growth of annual palatable species, and enhance the flora diversity

Effects of habitat and land use on breeding season density of male Asian Houbara Chlamydotis macqueenii

Landscape-scale habitat and land-use influences on Asian Houbara Chlamydotis macqueenii (IUCN Vulnerable) remain unstudied, while estimating numbers of this cryptic, low-density, over-hunted species is challenging. In spring 2013, male houbara were recorded at 231 point counts, conducted twice, across a gradient of sheep density and shrub assemblages within 14,300 km² of the Kyzylkum Desert, Uzbekistan. Four sets of models related male abundance to: (1) vegetation structure (shrub height and substrate); (2) shrub assemblage; (3) shrub species composition (multidimensional scaling); (4) remote-sensed derived land-cover (GLOBCOVER, 4 variables). Each set also incorporated measures of landscape rugosity and sheep density. For each set, multi-model inference was applied to generalised linear mixed models of visit-specific counts that included important detectability covariates and point ID as a random effect. Vegetation structure received strongest support, followed by shrub species composition and shrub assemblage, with weakest support for the GLOBCOVER model set. Male houbara numbers were greater with lower mean shrub height, more gravel and flatter surfaces, but were unaffected by sheep density. Male density (mean 0.14 km-2, 95% CI, 0.12‒0.15) estimated by distance analysis differed substantially among shrub assemblages, being highest in vegetation dominated by Salsola rigida (0.22 [CI, 0.20‒0.25]), high in areas of S. arbuscula and Astragalus (0.14 [CI, 0.13‒0.16] and 0.15 [CI, 0.14‒0.17] respectively), lower (0.09 [CI, 0.08‒0.10]) in Artemisia and lowest (0.04 [CI, 0.04‒0.05]) in Calligonum. The study area was estimated to hold 1,824 males (CI: 1,645‒2,030). The spatial distribution of relative male houbara abundance, predicted from vegetation structure models, had the strongest correspondence with observed numbers in both model-calibration and the subsequent year’s data. We found no effect of pastoralism on male distribution but potential effects on nesting females are unknown. Density differences among shrub communities suggest extrapolation to estimate country- or range-wide population size must take account of vegetation composition