DRY-FARMING CONGRESS, WICHITA, 1914 



77 



of growth in spring, a decrease in the amount of foliage produced, delays 

 the time of seed maturity and results either in non-fertile or very few 

 fertile seeds. 



2. Plants badly impoverished through continuous premature grazing 

 require from one to three years of protection to regain their vigor, suffi- 

 cient to produce fertile seeds, the time depending upon the extent to which 

 the plants have been weakened. 



3. Removal of the herbage after seed maturity in no way interferes 

 with plant growth unless the roots are injured by trampling. The time 

 that growth begins the following spring, the amount of foliage produced, 

 the amount of seed produced and the germination power of the seeds are 

 approximately the same as when the herbage is undisturbed during the 

 entire year. 



4. Germination of the seed and establishment of the seedlings very 

 largely depend upon the thoroughness with which the seed crop is planted. 

 Though nearly all seeds will germinate on the surface of the ground, the 

 resulting seedling plants, in a locality where the soil dries out early in the 

 season, as it does on most of our range lands, are unable to extend their 

 limited root systems deeply enough to reach the moist lower soil, and 

 consequently die from drought. The seed of the majority of our valuable 

 perennial range plants are comparatively large and smooth, and as a 

 consequence do not work themselves naturally beneath the surface of the 

 soil as do the seeds of porcupine grasses (Stipa) for example. If repro- 

 duction of these better species from seed is to be secured they must be 

 artificially covered. 



5. Even when a fertile seed crop is well planted approximately 50 

 percent of the resulting seedlings die as a result of drought and frost dur- 

 ing the first year when the roots have reached only a* superficial position 

 in the soil, and the remaining 50 percent will be largely destroyed if the 

 area is grazed early* in season the year following seeding. During . the 

 second and third seasons there is little loss from natural factors and the 

 plants make a rapid development. By the end of the third season the new 

 plants are well established and usually produce seed. 



These conclusions were established as the result of numerous plot 

 studies distributed over ranges in various stages of depletion from almost 

 denudation to areas on which the vegetation was in prime condition or 

 vigor. Approximately fifty species of important range plants were in- 

 cluded in the observations. 



With these data as a basis, a system of grazing known in the Forest 

 Service as "deferred and rotation grazing" was planned. The essential 

 principles of this system are: 



1. A portion of the range sufficiently large to supply the forage 

 from the time of seed maturity to the end of the grazing season is pro- 

 tected from stock until the seed crop has matured. 



2. Upon maturity of the seed crop the forage is grazed as closely a« 

 possible without injuring the seed plants by trampling. 



3. The same area is treated in the same way during the second year 



