Rangeland soil carbon and soil health can be complex. Get the facts and nuances below, and with our recent webinars on soil carbon specifically, and soil health on rangelands more generally.

Keys Facts on Soil Carbon on Colorado Rangelands

• How does carbon get into the soil?
  • Soil organic carbon is the long-term balance between the annual flow of carbon into soil through photosynthesis, and the flow out back to the atmosphere via CO2 from microbial respiration.¹
• Western rangelands can both sequester and emit carbon depending on weather.
  • In years with average or above-average precipitation, western rangelands can capture slightly more carbon than they emit on an annual basis, but in drought years this can be zero or even a net emission of carbon.^2,3
• Rangelands store large amounts of carbon, but adding to it through management is uncertain.
  • Rangelands store large amounts of carbon. Most of this carbon is stable. Only about ~15% is estimated to increase or decrease over months and years depending on the balance of photosynthesis and respiration.¹
  • A synthesis of 50 studies on improved grazing around the world showed that the response from improved grazing ranged from 50% carbon loss to 200% gain. Mean response was 10% increase in C, but 51% of studies reported a decrease in soil carbon in response to improved grazing.^1,4

Management Implications of What We Know On Rangeland Soil Carbon

• First do no harm:
  • Avoiding degradation to rangelands is one of the best things we can do to keep carbon in the ground.¹ Forms of degradation include: tillage, chronic overgrazing, chronic overuse in drought.
  • Practice adaptive livestock management, including adjusting livestock numbers in response to conditions (i.e., drought), in order to ensure sufficient plan cover and litter to prevent soil loss by wind and water. Drought conditions lead to soil carbon losses regardless of management, but the losses are greater for heavily stocked compared to moderately stocked or ungrazed rangelands.¹
    • Learn more on making a drought plan
    • Estimate how areas you graze fluctuate in drought using our Carrying Capacity Calculator.
• Restoration = biggest potential gains: Restoring degraded rangelands – such as former cropland or other degraded lands – has the largest potential to increase soil carbon.¹
  • Learn more on restoration research in Colorado.

Webinars on Soil Carbon and Soil Health

Rangeland Soil Carbon Webinar

Rangeland Soil Health Webinar

Other Resources

• Rangelands & Climate Change Fact Sheet From the University of Idaho, Rangeland FAQ Series
• CSU’s Soil Carbon Solutions Center

References

1. Sanderson, J. S., Beutler, C., Brown, J. R., Burke, I., Chapman, T., Conant, R. T., … & Sullivan, T. (2020). Cattle, conservation, and carbon in the western Great Plains. Journal of Soil and Water Conservation, 75(1), 5A-12A.
2. Launchbaugh, K. (2020). How is Climate Change Impacting the Working Rangelands of the Pacific Northwest? University of Idaho Rangeland FAQ Series, Science and Solutions for the Range, Fact Sheet 2. Available at: https://www.uidaho.edu/-/media/uidaho-responsive/files/cnr/research/rangeland/faq-series/climatechangefaq_f.pdf?la=en&rev=da8976310b424488a19ea2bcdd99cba5
3. Svejcar, T., Angell, R., Bradford, J. A., Dugas, W., Emmerich, W., Frank, A. B., … & Snyder, K. (2008). Carbon fluxes on North American rangelands. Rangeland Ecology & Management, 61(5), 465-474.
4. Conant, R. T., Cerri, C. E., Osborne, B. B., & Paustian, K. (2017). Grassland management impacts on soil carbon stocks: a new synthesis. Ecological Applications, 27(2), 662-668.