The University of Florida / IFAS South Florida Beef Forage Program (SFBFP) is composed of county Extension faculty and state specialists. The members, in conjunction with the UF/IFAS Program Evaluation and Organizational Development unit, created a survey in 1982, which is used to evaluate ranch management practices. The survey is updated and distributed every 5 years to ranchers in 14 South Florida counties: Charlotte, Collier, DeSoto, Glades, Hardee, Hendry, Highlands, Hillsborough, Lee, Manatee, Martin, Okeechobee, Polk, and Sarasota. The responses are anonymous.
Paleoclimate reconstructions for the western US show spatial variability in the timing, duration, and magnitude of climate changes within the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA, ca. 900–1350 CE) and Little Ice Age (LIA, ca. 1350–1850 CE), indicating that additional data are needed to more completely characterize late-Holocene climate change in the region. Here, we use dendrochronology to investigate how climate changes during the MCA and LIA affected a treeline, whitebark pine ( Pinus albicaulis Engelm.) ecosystem in the Greater Yellowstone Ecoregion (GYE). We present two new millennial-length tree-ring chronologies and multiple lines of tree-ring evidence from living and remnant whitebark pine and Engelmann spruce ( Picea engelmannii Parry ex. Engelm.) trees, including patterns of establishment and mortality; changes in tree growth; frost rings; and blue-intensity-based, reconstructed summer temperatures, to highlight the terminus of the LIA as one of the coldest periods of the last millennium for the GYE. Patterns of tree establishment and mortality indicate conditions favorable to recruitment during the latter half of the MCA and climate-induced mortality of trees during the middle-to-late LIA. These patterns correspond with decreased growth, frost damage, and reconstructed cooler temperature anomalies for the 1800–1850 CE period. Results provide important insight into how past climate change affected important GYE ecosystems and highlight the value of using multiple lines of proxy evidence, along with climate reconstructions of high spatial resolution, to better describe spatial and temporal variability in MCA and LIA climate and the ecological influence of climate change.
Struggle over land and scarce resources have resulted in perennial and growing violent conflicts amongst arable crop farmers and cattle herdsmen in various parts of Nigeria. This study analyses the relationship between climate change and patterns of herders-crop farmers’ conflict in Zamfara state, Nigeria. Data for this study were acquired via semi structured questionnaire and Key Informant Interview. Purposeful sampling method was used to select six communities, while 260 farmers and 67 pastoralists were chosen as sample size for the survey based on Krejcie and Morgan’s formula. Descriptive statistics such as percentages, arithmetic mean and Likert rating scale were adopted to analyze the data for the study. Results from the findings indicated that farmers and herders in Zamfara state were within active years of economic and productive age (24 to 44 years). Nearly,75% of both farmers and pastoralists in the study communities professed there is high variability in rainfall pattern and increase in temperature. Three-quarter of the respondents confirmed that the nature of the conflicts was assault involving the use of arms; whereas two-fifth of the respondents affirmed that the conflict occurs during harvest and the planting seasons. The study concluded that climate change is the bane of incessant resource use conflicts in the study area. Thus a clearly formulated government policies and implementation framework that would boost climate change information forecasting and dissemination, adaptive capacity and ranch management will salvage the conflictual relationship subsisting between farmers and herders in the study area
This book is the result of six years' intensive research and brainstorming by a group of South Africans under the editorship of J. du P. Bothma, the incumbent of the Eugene Marais Chair of Wildlife Management at the University of Pretoria. The group, comprising professional botanists and zoologists, veterinarians and wildlife managers, emphasises the fact that game (in all its characteristics and attributes) is unquestionably a natural asset in many parts of southern Africa
Because of the normative and subjective nature of the terms sustainability and sustainable development, solutions tend to be applicable for specific regions but not the whole of society. Thus, it is imperative understand better how community stakeholders and decision makers define the concept of sustainability. Not only will greater understanding of such definitions add to our understanding of nature-society relations, but also in certain contexts, this understanding may help to promote realistic and effective decision-making at local levels. The objective of this study was to determine how amenity-driven gateway communities surrounding Yellowstone and Grand Teton National parks define, conceptualize, and perceive sustainability, and if those perceptions varied between time in residence, community of origin, or role within the community. Thirty-five key informant interviews were conducted with decision makers within the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem to meet the study objectives. Throughout study communities, definitions of sustainability focused on the environment, the economy, and multi-generational thinking, and it is believed that these similarities can be the starting point for communication and collaboration among gateway communities, the long-term sustainability of their individual communities, and the collective resource upon which they all depend, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
Continued warming could transform Greater Yellowstone fire regimes by mid-21st century
