A - Papers appearing in refereed journals
Romero-Ruiz, A., Rivero, M. J., Milne, A. E., Morgan, S., De-Meo-Filho, P., Pulley, S., Segura, C., Harris, P., Lee, M. R. F., Coleman, K., Cardenas, L. M. and Whitmore, A. P. 2023. Grazing livestock move by Levy walks: Implications for soil health and environment. Journal of Environmental Management. 345 (1), p. 118835. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2023.118835
Authors | Romero-Ruiz, A., Rivero, M. J., Milne, A. E., Morgan, S., De-Meo-Filho, P., Pulley, S., Segura, C., Harris, P., Lee, M. R. F., Coleman, K., Cardenas, L. M. and Whitmore, A. P. |
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Abstract | Grazing livestock plays an important role in the context of food security, agricultural sustainability and climate change. Understanding how livestock move and interact with their environment may offer new insights on how grazing practices impact soil and ecosystem functions at spatial and temporal scales where knowledge is currently limited. We characterized daily and seasonal grazing patterns using Global Positioning System (GPS) data from two grazing strategies: conventionally- and rotationally-grazed pastures. Livestock movement was consistent with the so-called Lévy walks, and could thus be simulated with Lévy-walk based probability density functions. Our newly introduced "Moovement model” links grazing patterns with soil structure and related functions by coupling animal movement and soil structure dynamics models, allowing to predict spatially-explicit changes in key soil properties. Predicted post-grazing management-specific bulk densities were consistent with field measurements and confirmed that rotational grazing produced similar disturbance as conventional grazing despite hosting higher stock densities. Harnessing information on livestock movement and its impacts in soil structure within a modelling framework can help testing and optimizing grazing strategies for ameliorating their impact on soil health and environment. |
Keywords | Levy walk; Soil structure; Soil compaction; TechnoGrazing; Cell grazing |
Year of Publication | 2023 |
Journal | Journal of Environmental Management |
Journal citation | 345 (1), p. 118835 |
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2023.118835 |
Web address (URL) | https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301479723016237?via%3Dihub |
Open access | Published as ‘gold’ (paid) open access |
Funder | Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council |
European Union | |
Natural Environment Research Council | |
Funder project or code | S2N - Soil to Nutrition - Work package 3 (WP3) - Sustainable intensification - optimisation at multiple scales |
S2N - Soil to Nutrition - Work package 2 (WP2) - Adaptive management systems for improved efficiency and nutritional quality | |
Agri-tech Cornwall | |
Growing Health [ISP] | |
AgZero+ | |
Growing Health (WP2) - bio-inspired solutions for healthier agroecosystems: Understanding soil environments | |
Growing Health (WP3) - bio-inspired solutions for healthier agroecosystems: Discovery landscapes | |
Publisher's version | |
Supplemental file | |
Output status | Published |
Publication dates | |
Online | 31 Aug 2023 |
Publication process dates | |
Accepted | 14 Aug 2023 |
Publisher | Elsevier |
ISSN | 0301-4797 |
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