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Patterns of Plant Selection by Grazing Cattle in Two Savanna Grasslands: A Plant's Eye View

T.G. O'Connor
Journal of the Grassland Society of Southern Africa

Excerpt from Introduction:
"A grassland offers a grazing ungulate a range of species which might differ in their dietary qualities, morphology and structure. Species selection is the norm of ungulate response....while moribund material....and plant structure....can also influence selection. Adjacent areas of apparently homogeneous vegetation can be differentially grazed, resulting in patch 'overgrazing'.....However, the generalizations about grazing selectivity emerging from these empirical studies are not qualitative but quantitative (e.g. less preferred species are usually grazed to some extent) and conditional (e.g. this is a preferred species if it does not have a lot of reproductive culms)...."

Contents:
  • Introduction
  • Procedure
  • Results
  • Discussion
  • Acknowledgments
  • References
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Patterns of Plant Selection -1992 pdf size: 2.69mb
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