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1. Multiresource Pastoralism, Dynamic Foodways, and Ancient Statecraft in Mongolia

   https://doi.org/10.3390/land12091715  

   Honeychurch, William ; Amartuvshin, Chunag ; Wright, Joshua ; Carolus, Christina ; Hrivnyak, Michelle ( September 2023 , Land)

   Pastoral nomadic regional confederations, states, and empires have assumed a prominent place in the histories of the Eurasian steppe zone; however, anthropological theory devoted to understanding these political systems is still debated and relatively inchoate. A major question concerns the techniques of political integration that might have brought together dispersed mobile herders under the aegis of these complex, large-scale steppe polities. The first such polity in East Asia, the Xiongnu state (c. 250 BC–150 AD) of Mongolia, has been characterized as a polity built by mobile herders, but in fact the steppe populations of this period followed quite diverse lifeways. Most notably, the establishment of more permanent settlements for craft and agricultural production has complicated the typical narrative of the pastoral nomadic eastern steppe. This study considers ways to conceptualize these interesting variations in lifeway during the Xiongnu period and raises the question of how they might have promoted a novel Xiongnu political order. We analyze transformations within the Egiin Gol valley of northern Mongolia to better understand the organizational, productive, and settlement dynamics and present the first regional landscape perspective on the local transformations incurred by the creation of a Xiongnu agricultural hub. To understand these radical changes with respect to the long-term pastoral nomadic and hunting-gathering traditions of the valley’s inhabitants, Salzman’s flexibility-based model of multiresource pastoralism is of great use. Egiin Gol valley transformations indeed attest to a scale of political economy far beyond the bounds of this local area and suggest an innovative role for indigenous farming in Eurasian steppe polity building. 

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2. Pastoralist activities affect the movement patterns of a large African carnivore, the spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta)

   https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyz135  

   Green, David S. ; Holekamp, Kay E. ; Goheen, ed., Jacob ( September 2019 , Journal of Mammalogy)

   Populations of large carnivores are declining in many parts of the world due to anthropogenic activity. Some species of large carnivores, however, are able to coexist with people by altering their behavior. Altered behaviors may be challenging to identify in large carnivores because these animals are typically cryptic, nocturnal, live at low densities, and because changes in their behavior may be subtle or emerge slowly over many years. We studied the effects of livestock presence on the movements of one large carnivore, the spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta). We fit 22 adult female spotted hyenas with GPS collars to quantify their movements in areas with and without livestock or herders present, in and around a protected area in southwestern Kenya. We investigated anthropogenic, social, and ecological effects on the speed of movement, distances traveled, long-distance movements, and extraterritorial excursions by spotted hyenas. Hyenas living primarily within the protected area, but in the presence of livestock and herders, moved faster, traveled over longer distances, and were more likely to be within their territories than did conspecifics living in areas without livestock and herders. Hyenas of low social rank were more likely than hyenas of high social rank to engage in long-distance travel events, and these were more likely to occur when prey were scarce. The movement patterns of this large African carnivore indicate a flexibility that may allow them to persist in landscapes that are becoming increasingly defined by people.

    

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3. Mechanisms and drivers of alternative shrubland states

   https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.3987  

   Archer, Steven R. ; Peters, Debra P. C. ; Burruss, N. Dylan ; Yao, Jin ( April 2022 , Ecosphere)

   Grassland‐to‐shrubland state change has been widespread in arid lands globally. Long‐term records at the Jornada Basin USDA‐LTER site in the North American Chihuahuan Desert document the time series of transition from grassland dominance in the 1850s to shrubland dominance in the 1990s. This broadscale change ostensibly resulted from livestock overgrazing in conjunction with periodic drought and represents the classic “grassland‐to‐shrubland” regime shift. However, finer‐scale observations reveal a more nuanced view of this state change that includes transitions from dominance by one shrub functional type to another (e.g., based on leaf habit [evergreen vs. deciduous], N₂fixation potential, and drought tolerance). We analyzed the Jornada Basin historic vegetation data using a fine‐scale grid and classified the dominant vegetation in the resulting 890 cells on each of four dates (1858, 1915, 1928, and 1998). This analysis allowed us to quantify on contrasting soil geomorphic units the rate and spatial distribution of: (1) state change from grasslands to shrublands across the Jornada Basin, (2) transitions between shrub functional groups, and (3) transitions from shrub‐to‐grass dominance. Results from our spatially explicit, decadal timescale perspective show that: (1) shrubland ecosystems developing on former grasslands were spatially and temporally more dynamic than has been generally presumed, (2) in some locations, shrublands initially developing on grasslands subsequently transitioned to ecosystems dominated by a different shrub functional type, with these changes in shrub composition likely involving changes in soil properties, and (3) some shrub‐dominated locations have reverted to grass dominance. Accordingly, traditional, broad characterizations of “grassland‐to‐shrubland” state change may be too simplistic. An accounting of these complexities and transitions from one shrub functional group to another is important for projecting state change consequences for ecosystem processes. Understanding the mechanisms, drivers, and influence of interactions between patterns and processes on transitions between shrub states defined by woody plant functional types will be germane to predicting future landscape change.

    

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4. Traditional Nomadism Offers Adaptive Capacity to Northern Mongolian Geohazards

   https://doi.org/10.3390/geohazards4030019  

   Moreau, Gabrielle L. ; Nyland, Kelsey E. ; Kuklina, Vera V. ( September 2023 , GeoHazards)

   Mongolia’s northernmost province, Khövsgöl Aimag, famous for its massive Lake Khövsgöl set among the mountainous steppe, taiga, and tundra forests, increasingly attracts both domestic and international tourists. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Mongolia received over 500,000 tourists annually. The aimag is also home to Indigenous, nomadic Dukha reindeer herders and semi-nomadic Darkhad cattle herders. Using a multidisciplinary approach, this study uses an analytical hierarchy process to map areas in Khövsgöl Aimag, where the infrastructure, including buildings, dwellings, formal and informal roads, and pastureland, is subject to geohazards. The hazards of interest to this mapping analysis include mass wasting, flooding, and permafrost thawing, which threaten roads, pastures, houses, and other community infrastructure in Khövsgöl Aimag. Based on the integrated infrastructure risk map, an estimated 23% of the aimag is at high to very high risk for localized geohazards. After a discussion of the results informed by the interviews, mobile ethnographies, and local and national land use policies, we postulate that communities exercising more traditional nomadic lifestyles with higher mobility are more resilient to these primarily localized geohazards. 

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5. Comparing process-based models with the inventory approach to predict CH 4 emission of livestock enteric fermentation

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/acb6a8  

   Zhang, Jianan ; Chen, Lan ; Chen, Yizhao ; Groisman, Pavel ( February 2023 , Environmental Research Letters)

   Livestock production is the largest anthropogenic methane (CH₄) source globally over the decades. Enteric fermentation of ruminants is responsible for the majority of global livestock CH₄emissions. Both inventory-based models (IvtMs) and process-based models (PcMs) are extensively used to assess the livestock CH₄emission dynamics. However, the model performance and the associated uncertainty have not been well quantified and understood, which greatly hamper our credibility of the regional and global CH₄emission predictions. In this study, we compared the CH₄emissions of livestock enteric fermentation (CH_4,ef) predicted by multiple IvtMs and PcMs across Inner Mongolia, a region dominated by typical temperate grasslands that are widely used for animal husbandry. Twenty predictions from five IvtMs, and ten predations from five PcMs were explicitly calculated and compared for the reference year of 2006. The CH_4,efpredicted from PcMs is lower than IvtMs and the variation between PcMs is substantially higher, i.e. 0.34 ± 0.36 g CH₄/m²yr and 0.78 ± 0.14 g CH₄/m²yr for PcMs and IvtMs, respectively. Different model strategies undertaken, i.e. the demand-oriented strategy for IvtMs and the resource-demand co-determined one for PcMs, cause the different predictions of CH_4,efbetween the two model groups. Using the results from IvtMs as the baseline scalar, we identified and benchmarked the performance of individual PcMs in the study region. The quantitative information provided can facilitate the understanding of key principles and processes of CH_4,efestimations, which will contribute to the future model development of global CH₄emission.

    

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