Events emphasize compatibility of grazing and wildlife conservation

The Kansas Grazing Lands Coalition (KGLC) will provide two one-day workshops entitled Tracking Pasture Health on Sept. 22 at the Ted Alexander ranch, near Sun City, and Sept. 29 at the Calvin Adams ranch, south of Beloit. Led by Charley Orchard, Land EKG of Bozeman, Mont., the workshops are designed for ranchers and land managers interested in conservation. Each workshop starts at 8 a.m.

Tracking Pasture Health workshops provide an overview of land and grazing monitoring. Outdoor, hands-on training focuses on the myths of monitoring, the five most useful monitoring techniques, grazing scoring methods, forage production calculations, understanding transects, production and grazing budgets, rapid ecological assessments, and interpreting the monitoring results. The Land EKG technique allows the user to consistently track relative soil and plant community health by assessing four basic ecological components: water cycling, nutrient cycling, energy flow, and biotic state -- all depicted on an eco-graph. Producers can learn to optimize profit, help promote land stewardship, better prescribe best land management practices, and be able to document and defend their decisions as they relate to ownership and leases.

Enrollment for the workshops runs through Sept. 15. The cost is $35 per workshop and includes lunch onsite. Each participant will leave the session with a field packet full of information.

Sponsors of the workshops include the High Plains Resource Conservation and Development Council, Kansas Farm Bureau, the Kansas Sustainable Agriculture Research Education (SARE) program, the Playa Lakes Joint Venture, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Quail Forever.

For additional information, phone Tim Christian at 620-241-3636 or email him at tchristian@kglc.org. More details are also available at the KGLC website.

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