1. Sokoine University of Agriculture Official Publications

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Browsing 1. Sokoine University of Agriculture Official Publications by Subject "Canopy cover"

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    Vegetation composition and productivity in reserved grazing area of Lubungo village in Mvomero district
    (Rangeland Society of Tanzania (RST), 2022) Tito E. Mdegela,; Ephraim J. Mtengeti; George Msalya
    Most reserved grazing areas within the villages in Tanzania are continuously grazed and are heavily encroached by bushes. An inventory of 8.4ha reserved grazing land resources of Lubungo village in Mvomero District was conducted towards the end of the dry season of 2018, to assess pasture species composition, ground vegetation cover, dry mater yield, tree density and canopy cover The soil physical, chemical and plant seedbank characteristics were also assessed. Line interception method was used to assess pasture species composition and ground cover. From each line interception sampling unit of 10m tape measure, two quadrat frame each 0.25m 2 were thrown at random in left and right side of he sampling unit to sample desirable pastures and soil for determination of the pasture dry matter yield and soil physical and chemical properties. One soil sample at a depth of 5cm and 30cm x 30 cm wide was collected for soil seedbank determination in the bare soil patch around each line interception sampling unit in order to be sure if the grazing land is rested wouldn’t come back with desirable vegetation. Eight parallel lines interception sampling units were fitted in each transect line of 700 m at 70 m interval. Three transect lines 40 m apart were established in the reserved grazing land. The Point Centered Quarter (PCQ) method was used to determine tree density and their canopy caver. The ground cover of desirable pasture, undesirable pasture species, and litter was 67.7 %, 10.5% and 9.4 % respectively. The bare patches covered 12.3 % of the grazing land. The most dominant grass species was Enteropogon macrostachyus followed by Bothriocloa insculpta and Heteropogon contortus. Soil bulk density, pH, organic carbon, Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium were 1.4g/cm -3 , 6.3, 1.14%, 0.09%, 0.89 mg/kg and 0.33 g/kg, respectively. A total of 11 dicotyledonous species mainly forbs and 9 monocotyledonous species with only four perennial grasses were revealed from the soil seedbank. Dry matter yield of the desirable pasture was 806.8 kg DM per ha and tree density was 1500/ha with the total canopy cover of 63.49%. The most dominant tree species was Combretum collinum. The vegetation type of the grazing land was therefore Combretum- Enteropogon bushed grassland. From this inventory results it can be concluded that the reserved grazing area had very low pasture productivity, poor soil seedbank and high bush encroachment. In order to improve pasture productivity therefore there is a need of bush clearing and reseeding the reserved Lubungo village grazing land.