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Unit 3: Systems in Action
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Cattle on irrigated pasture, Colorado. (Gary Cramer, USDA NRCS) |
Monitoring the ecosystem is also a key element in livestock production systems. In Holistic Management ®, for example, one of the cornerstones of whole farm planning is biological monitoring to assess the health of the land and productivity of the system as a whole. The main features of monitoring in this context are:
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the use of simple strategies and techniques,
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a goal of predicting changes and trends in the landscape in order to develop an effective response,
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evaluation of plant growth rates, water and nutrient cycles,
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analysis of both land performance and animal performance, and
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the use of criteria that will help anticipate adverse impacts before they become major problems.
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