What are climax species
of native range forage?

Climax species of native range forage refers to agriculturally and ecologically important grasses and forbs (native range vegetation) that grows naturally on our state's, our country's rangelands. Their presence and survival plays a vital role in preserving rangeland ranching in Texas and other range states and regions. The following is a list of native grasses and forbs that grow on U.S. rangelands:

Desert species

• black grama
• tobosa
• sand dropseed
• perennial threeawn
• fluffgrass

Short-grass species

• blue grama
• buffalograss
• curly mesquite
• western wheat grass

Mid- and tall-grass species

• little bluestem
• silver bluestem
• sideoats grama
• Virgina wildrye
• Canada wildrye
• Texas bluegrass
• Texas wintergrass
• big bluestem
• yellow indiangrass
• eastern gamagrass
• switchgrass
• cordgrass
• dropseed
• Maximilian sunflower
• Illinois bundleflower
• purple & white prairie clover
• Engelmann daisy

Forest species

• Carolina wiregrass

Comments

It should be noted that the ability of U.S. prairie grasses and forbs to survive grazing and fire was the result of thousands of years of natural evolution and development, or in other words, was the result of thousands of years of

• grazing and browsing by herbivores
• wildfires started by lighting strikes
• prescribed fires started by native people.

It is also important to note that the use of fire is a natural way for keeping agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands largely free of invasive plant species.

Back