IMPROVEMENT OF PASTURES ENCROACHED BY SHRUBS THROUGH ANIMAL GRAZING IN AN ITALIAN ALPINE ENVIRONMENT

In some Italian Alpine environments the strong reduction of pastoral activities and the incorrect management of animal grazing in grasslands and rangelands are causing vegetal evolution, development of woody plants, reduction of species number and a general worsening of canopy quality. In 1999 a trial was carried out to evaluate the possibility to improve canopy quality through animal grazing. Site of the trial was a long-period abandoned pasture of Italian Alps, at about 1800 m above the sea level. About two thousand sheep were kept for several hours in areas characterised by different shrubs contributions. An analysis of the vegetation was made just before and after animal grazing in 1999, as well as in summers 2000 and 2001, to assess vegetal evolution in the following years. The first results seem to confirm that an improvement of pastures encroached by shrubs is possible through an intensive animal grazing. The pasture showed an amelioration of the pastoral value and an increase of the number of herbaceous species in the areas in which the shrubs cover was not yet in an advanced stage.