Plants Emerging from Soils Under Three Range Condition Classes of Desert Grassland

This research was conducted to determine emergence of seedlings from surface soil collected on black grama (Bouteloua eriopoda) grassland sites in good, fair, and poor condition classes. The species that emerged and their numbers were compared to the species actually found on the field locations. The following conclusions were drawn: (1) The fair condition site had more seedlings emerge than the other two and of these seedlings by far the most were grasses; (2) Mesa dropseed (Sporobolus flexuosus) was the most abundant grass species emerging from collected soil for all three condition classes, but it was much more abundant from fair condition soil; (3) Though black grama dominated the good condition range, emergence of black grama seedlings in the greenhouse from collected soil was much below expectations; (4) More plant species occurred in the field than emerged from collected soils; (5) Secondary successional patterns cannot be predicted accurately from techniques used in this study; (6) Mesa dropseed appears to be a key mid-successional species, filling a broad niche from low good to low fair range condition.This material was digitized as part of a cooperative project between the Society for Range Management and the University of Arizona Libraries.The Journal of Range Management archives are made available by the Society for Range Management and the University of Arizona Libraries. Contact lbry-journals@email.arizona.edu for further information.Migrated from OJS platform August 202