Timber management is the most prominent land management activity in the Black Hills National Forest in the northcentral United States. Management units are stands 4–32ha in size and are described using a hierarchal vegetative description including vegetation type, size class (age), and overstory canopy cover. For the most part, these stands are relatively homogeneous resulting from decades of even-aged management.

The conservation opportunity literature increasingly emphasises opportunity cost as an important determinant of willingness to engage in conservation on private land. We investigated the explanatory power of a group of opportunity cost variables in the decision to participate in a landscape-level conservation initiative on the Agulhas Plain, Cape Floristic Region. Opportunity cost variables outperformed affiliation and demographic variables when used in one model and had almost as much explanatory power as the combined model when used on their own.

Little information is available about the effects of global warming and land management on dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentration in soil solution in the field. Here, for the first time, we used a free-air temperature enhancement (FATE) system in a controlled warming-grazing experiment in 2006 and 2007 to test the hypothesis that grazing modifies the response of soil solution DOC concentration to experimental warming.

Geographic information systems (GIS) analysis considering size and spatial distribution of infestations of invasive species on a landbase can assist with developing appropriate control strategies for that species. We used GIS to evaluate strategies that placed highest priority on: smallest patches of cogongrass, largest patches of cogongrass, and cogongrass patches on land considered high-value under military training and conservation priorities on Camp Shelby Joint Forces Training Center (CSJFTC), MS.

Japanese clematis, a herbaceous to woody vine native to Asia, has been widely used for landscaping in the southeastern United States and is now a naturalized and invasive in Florida. Herbicides that contain the active ingredients fluroxypyr, glyphosate, imazapic, metsulfuron, or triclopyr, applied alone or in combination on a spray-to-wet basis, were evaluated for their effectiveness to control the plant in a natural area of Gainesville, FL. All herbicide treatments provided some level of control 30, 60, and 90 d after application.

Several influential reports have suggested that one of the most appropriate responses to expected food shortages and ongoing environmental degradation is sustainable intensification, i.e. the increase of food production with at worst no increase in environmental harm, and ideally environmental benefit. Here we sought evidence of sustainable intensification among British farmers by selecting innovative arable, dairy, mixed and upland farms and analysing their own data on yields, inputs and land use and management for 2006 and 2011.

A longitudinal study of California hardwood rangelands shows significant change in landowner characteristics and goals. Results of three studies spanning 1985 to 2004 were used to develop and evaluate a multiagency research and extension program known as the Integrated Hardwood Range Management Program. Program-sponsored education and research aimed at encouraging landowners to change woodland management has been reflected in a significant reduction in oak cutting and an increase in oak planting.

Successful prairie restoration will depend in part on convincing private landowners with agricultural and recreational use goals to implement appropriate rangeland management practices, such as prescribed burning and cattle grazing, to control invasive species and encroachment of woody plants. However, landowners have been slow to adopt appropriate practices in the US Midwest. The purpose of this study was to explore attitudes and behaviors of private landowners toward prescribed burning and moderate stocking as rangeland management tools.

The purpose of the stewardship contracting authority is to allow public land managers to achieve land management goals while meeting local rural community needs. The authority's use is on the rise, and many regard stewardship contracting as a win-win mechanism for federal land management and a means of ending the "timber wars" on public land. This report provides an overview of stewardship contracting, with a focus on improvements needed for it to reach its full potential.

The evaluation of landscape services essentially deals with the complex and dynamic relationships between humans and their environment. When it comes to landscape management and the evaluation of the benefits these services provide for our well-being, there is a limited representation of stakeholder and intangible values on the land. Stakeholder knowledge is essential, since disciplinary expert evaluations and existing proxy data on landscape services can reveal little of the landscape benefits to the local stakeholders.

Choosing effective policy instruments to achieve conservation goals has many challenges. We explore the challenge of instrument choice in the context of landscape-scale conservation on private land, where the challenge is to select instruments that are able to influence the management practices of large numbers of landholders with diverse values, beliefs and management priorities. We report on a landholder survey and workshop undertaken as part of a study focused on reversing scattered tree decline on private grazing land in Australia.