APPLICATION OF HERBIVORE OPTIMIZATION THEORY TO RANGELANDS OF THE WESTERN UNITED-STATES

Ecological research can be misinterpreted by the popular press and misapplied in land management. One example of this concerns the controversial concepts of overcompensation by grazed plants and herbivore optimization of plant productivity (or, as popularly phrased, the idea that plants benefit from being grazed). Although available evidence indicates that whole-plant overcompensation and optimization of productivity rarely occur and may have little or no evolutionary or applied significance, these concepts have been accepted by some popular writers and land managers, and are being used to justify heavy livestock grazing on western North American rangelands. There may be many reasons for this acceptance of unsubstantiated hypotheses, including uncritical reading and overly broad extrapolations by writers and managers, as well as failure by scientists to clearly and accurately communicate results and conclusions.