#silvopasture

[probablyasocialecologist]

Trees in cattle pastures nearly double biodiversity across 15 countries, analysis shows

Cattle ranching is the biggest driver of tropical deforestation, but it is also a key livelihood for nearly 1 billion smallholder farmers. A

"Native forests remain irreplaceable refuges for rare species, forest specialists, and animals that require large, undisturbed habitats—something that managed agricultural operations cannot fully provide," emphasizes Prof. Dr. Emily Poppenborg Martin, Professor of Animal Ecology at JLU and senior author of the publication. "Rather than being seen as a substitute for forest conservation, silvopastoral systems should be understood as an effective complement to it. They create secondary habitats between forest fragments, improving landscape continuity and restoring the ecological function of degraded pastures. In this way, these systems can enhance the conservation value of surrounding protected areas." This distinction is significant for policymakers seeking to achieve ambitious global restoration goals. "Integrating trees into cattle pastures represents a scientifically sound strategy for restoring biodiversity on agricultural land, but only if it is implemented strategically and with consideration for geography, species, and local context," says Prof. Poppenborg Martin. "It is also important that the promotion of silvopastoral systems does not inadvertently contribute to further deforestation." However, when carefully implemented, silvopastoral systems offer a promising way to reconcile the competing demands of food production and biodiversity conservation in the world's most threatened landscapes.

26 May 2026

[rederiswrites]

The other day I was taking Minnie the bottle baby, who is experiencing some pretty serious intestinal distress, for her extra pampering. Having always rather liked being held, she was totally comfortable being toted along like a rolled up rug, and took the passing opportunity to grab some fresh maple shoots.

Nom.

So I started giving her some every time she gets her extra hydration and treatments. And then I brought some for the other bottle babies, because there are of course quite a few shoots growing down into our headspace, and these trees are right next to the deck. They need to be kept in order. Also they do not understand that Minnie is sick, so all they know is she gets treats and they don't, and that is a bunch of bullshit.

Kazoo and Binabik are enthusiastic.

But oh, what's this? Some of the other lambs would like to know what I've got that's so special!

On the right we have the one we very inventively call "the red one". He's decided it's worth chancing proximity to the human.

And next thing I know,

Damn, dudes! Y'all used to be so standoffish! Man, lambing season and some bottle babies really broke down barriers. There are grown ewes coming up in the back there. Half a year ago you couldn't get within fifteen feet of them.

In the center here, facing the camera, is the firstborn of the flock, not only a ram lamb but also one of only two single-born lambs. He is the only named lamb besides the bottle babies, and as the firstborn of Kratos, naturally, his name is Atreus.

In the back is a VERY scruffy ewe we'd love to catch and roo.

And all of them are on lush, fresh early summer grass, but they're here crowding me for a chance at a handful of broadleaf browse. Really reinforces my commitment to growing more trees for fodder. Many sheep like browse (shoots and leaves of trees), and Soay are particularly partial. Browse has other advantages as well, such as being more drought resistant than grass, offering excellent nutrition, and, well, there are trees.

Bonus of Kratos the ram happily noshing on some weeds gathered 'round the compost heap. His favorite midwinter treat is Christmas trees. He'll even chew the bark off.

[wachinyeya]

This Colombian 'hotel for cows' could help reduce deforestation in the Amazon

Clearing land for cattle and cows is the single biggest driver of rainforest loss in the Amazon. This "hotel for cows" in Colombia offers a

[useless-catalanfacts]

Photos by Marc Rovellada Ballesteros published in La Mira and Happyxais.

Daniel is a shepherd who has been hired by the City Council of El Bruc (a town in Central Catalonia) to graze in the natural areas between the area's towns. Like other shepherds who work in the traditional way, he practises transhumance (seasonal nomadism to take the animals to the best pastures), and when the herd comes to El Bruc their grazing is this job. In modern times, this job is usually done by the municipal brigade with chainsaws and string trimmers, but Daniel's herd can do it just as well. It consists of 150 sheep, 130 goats, 4 dogs and 1 donkey, as well as the shepherd himself. Grazing in this area, they keep the vegetation to a controlled level, making it safer and reducing the chances of a wildfire.

Shepherding and grazing have been used in this way for millennia, uninterruptedly in many places, and now a few urban areas like El Bruc are joining again in what is being called "silvopasture". Grazing in urban areas is more demanding for the shepherd, because he has to be careful with cars, domestic animals, and neighbours, but in the end it is a mutually-beneficial arrangement.

Daniel shares snippets of his job in his Instagram account Happyxais.savall.

[aisling-saoirse]

Riparian Restoration at New Bolton - November 19th 2023

[gardeningwithpina]

Hay from trees such as ash and elm is a traditional cattle and animal fodder. Tree hay from pollarding of trees is part of the traditional silvopasture agricultural system of agroforestry that predates the monocultures of modern farming methods that are so unsustainable for wildlife and the wider environment.

[rjzimmerman]

The secret to curbing farm emissions is buried in the Stone Age

When farmers reduce tilling, plant cover crops, and speckle their steads with livestock and trees, they're helping fight climate change and bolstering their bottom lines.

Excerpt from this story from Popular Science:

Along a stretch of rural highway in the coastal plains of North Carolina sits an unusual forest. The viridian-green branches of loblolly pines rise 60 feet above a carpet of soft, tufted grasses, rippling slightly in the breeze. The trees are widely spaced, 20 to 30 feet apart, with their lower limbs removed, creating an airy, cathedral-like canopy speckled with sunlight filtering through the needles.

The woodland has a strangely serene, primeval feel. A sudden wave of grunting reveals large black shapes moving in the distance. A pickup approaches, further breaking the reverie, and out hops a slender middle-aged man in a ball cap.

“Buron Lanier,” he says, extending a hand. “Sorry I’m late. I was just finishing up with a calf.”

The shapes, Lanier’s Red Angus cattle, amble over. This forest, 100 acres of his 400-acre Piney Woods Farm, is their grazing ground—a modern incarnation of an ancient technique called silvopasture, an integration of forest and fauna.

Environmental scientists, though, see the reemergence of silvopasture as a means to slow down climate change. Livestock produce two-thirds of all agricultural emissions, and methane from burping cows is the largest slice of that. Lanier is skeptical that global warming is real, but his pines, in siphoning CO2 from sky to earth, are nonetheless helping cancel out his bovine contribution to planetary disaster.

Farmers and ranchers across the country are turning back the agricultural clock in order to convert the land they steward into ammunition in the climate fight. In total, cultivation sends about 8 billion tons of carbon into the air each year. That’s nearly one-quarter of emissions—​roughly the same as heat and electricity production combined, and far more than transportation.

Anecdotally, the United States Department of Agriculture sees a tiny but growing number of silvopasture farms, while other methods that suck greenhouse gases from the air—​collectively known as carbon farming—​are experiencing greater resurgences. The once-ubiquitous practice of plowing, which chucks soil-bound carbon into the atmosphere as it churns the ground, has disappeared from 21 percent of acreage. Cover crops, typically sown in the offseason and left in fields to decompose, are also rising in popularity.

[queerpyracy]

Silvopasture Can Mitigate Climate Change. Will U.S. Farmers Take it Seriously? | Civil Eats

The ancient, sustainable practice of pasturing animals among trees is gaining traction in the U.S. If it scales up, it could help shrink our carbon footprint.

Steve Gabriel curls back a bit of flimsy net fencing and shakes a plastic bucket of alfalfa pellets. Immediately, a sweet-faced, short-fleeced mob of some 50 Katahdin sheep pull away from a line of young black locust trees on whose leaves they’ve been snacking and swarm around him. The sheep race after Gabriel as he strides across nibbled grass and out from the fencing, around a dirt path’s shallow curve, and into a shadier, overgrown pasture dotted with longstanding black walnut and hawthorn trees.

Gabriel is an agroforestry specialist at Cornell University’s Small Farms Program. He’s also the author of the book on silvopasture, a farming technique that’s touted as a way to sequester carbon by growing trees in livestock pastures.

Trees absorb and sequester large amounts of carbon over time; they’re rendered even more powerful when they’re used in concert with grazing and planted on “marginal” land that isn’t great for growing crops—what Gabriel calls the “funky edges” around, say, healthy woodlands. On the heels of the latest, dire, National Climate Assessment, ag-based climate solutions such as silvopasture could provide much-needed climate benefits—if they can be scaled up.

Project Drawdown, a group of international scientists and policymakers that modeled the 80 most effective ways to battle climate change, ranks silvopasture number nine on its list, reporting that it could reduce CO2 emissions by over 31 gigatons by 2050 if it were ramped up from its current 351 million acres to 554 million acres worldwide.

There are no good estimates of how much land in the U.S. is currently devoted to silvopasture. The amount, though, is small, which means there’s potential for  the practice to play much a larger role here; worldwide, it accounts for about 15 percent of all grazing land.

This prompts the question: Can more American farmers get the message about silvopasture’s positive qualities, and can the resources necessary to get them started with it, or transition to it, be made more readily available?

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