Exotic Brome-Grasses in Arid and Semiarid Ecosystems of the Western US

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be affected by management actions and including local and scientifi c knowledge in
all phases of the process (Fig. 12.1 ). Below, we discuss how the generalized steps of
adaptive management—planning, implementation, and evaluation—can be applied
to Bromus management in the Western USA.

12.3.1 Planning

The planning step involves assessing conditions of the restoration site to defi ne man-
agement problems (Rist et al. 2013 ) and prioritize management questions (Reever-
Morghan et al. 2006 ). In this step, both quantitative and qualitative data are evaluated
to establish current knowledge about the system and identify uncertainties about its
function and response to management activities (Rist et al. 2013 ). For example,
acquiring a basic understanding of climate, soils vegetation, and plant community
characteristics and indicators of ecological processes helps determine the site poten-
tial and limitations and the appropriate assessment and monitoring variables for an
annual grass control project (Herrick et al. 2006 ; Miller et al. 2014 ). This informa-
tion can be compared to site-specifi c standards to clarify the ecological processes
that must be addressed at the project site (Sheley et al. 2011 ). Quantitative data from
research conducted on similar ecological sites should also be obtained to forecast
how potential land treatments might impact vegetation and soils (Karl et al. 2012 ).
Forecasting how restoration interventions may impact specifi c ecological pro-
cesses and remediate the common characteristics identifi ed for Bromus (see Sects.
12.1 – 12.5 ) is essential to planning (Herrick et al. 2012 ). However, due to the
dynamic nature of plant community succession and extreme variability in weather
from year to year (Hardegree et al. 2012 ), it may be diffi cult to identify which eco-
logical processes to monitor and how they infl uence desired successional trajecto-
ries. To address this uncertainty, restoration practitioners have developed

Assess

Design

Monitor Implement

Evaluate

Adjust

Implementation

Evaluation

Planning

Stakeholders

Technical learning

Technical learning

Fig. 12.1 The adaptive
management cycle with
three primary steps:
planning, implementation,
and evaluation.
Stakeholder involvement
has a central role and
integrates elements of the
cycle. Both technical
learning ( gray arrow ) and
institutional learning occur
during the adaptive
management cycle to
improve decision-making

T.A. Monaco et al.