Rangelands
Total area of Iran s rangelands is about 86 million ha. The request forage for the grazing livestock on rangelands is sufficient feeding 37 million of animal units during a 7 months grazing period while 83 million of animal units currently graze over rangelands during 7 months per year.
The rangelands of Iran are classified into three classes according to extent and conditions:
|
conditions
|
Area(million ha)
|
Percentage
|
|
Good
|
9,3
|
10,3
|
|
Poor- Fair
|
37,3
|
41.45
|
|
Poor
|
43,4
|
48,25
|
In Iran, as in other countries, rangelands are also categorized based on the time of grazing as:
-Alpine or summer grazing rangelands;
-Lowland or winter grazing rangelands.
-Alpine or summer grazing rangelands:
In alpine rangelands, cold weather causes the phenological cycle of plants to start later than plants in lower areas. The alpine rangelands with approximately ban area of 23 million hectares out of 86 million hectares of total rangelands in the country , produces 6.21 million tons allowed DM(Dry Matter) equal to 3.415 million tons T.D.N(Total Digestible Nutrients). These rangelands are grazed for 100 days and they support about45 million AU (Animal Unit).
-Lowland or winter grazing rangelands:
Unlike the alpine rangelands that enjoy cold weather in summer, these rangelands are located in the lower areas, where the whether is warm, and somewhat hot in summer: and plants start their growth from late winter, when the whether is warm enough. Part of these rangelands are located in very low areas making conditions so hot in summer that livestock are unable to tolerate the conditions due primarily to insufficient forage and secondly to a scarcity of water during summer time. The area of this kind of rangelands is estimated to be about 67 million hectares and they produce 4.49 million tons allowed DM, equal to 2.470 million tons allowed T.D.N in normal years.
According to the recent survey conducted by FRWO (2005), the area of rangelands is about 86,103,940 hectares and forests14, 202,559 and desert lands 32,579,631 hectares. This study took 3 years, using satellite images along with ground observation with GPS applied across the country.