In this article, we provide a synthesis of the peer-reviewed literature and state and federal policies focused on absentee landowners of forestland, rangeland, or farmland in the U.S. The synthesis indicates absentee owners, as compared to those living on the land, appear to be much more likely to live in urban areas, are less dependent financially upon the land and much more likely to own land for amenity reasons than production purposes.

It has been predicted that Europe will experience a rise in temperature of 2.2–5.3 °C within this century. This increase in temperature may lead to vegetation change along altitudinal gradients. To test whether vegetation composition has already changed in the recent decade due to current warming (and other concomitant environmental changes), we recorded plant species composition in 1995 and 2005/2006 in Swiss pre-alpine fen meadows (800–1,400 m a.s.l.).

The Grassland Reserve Program (GRP) was established by the 2002 Farm Bill to provide assistance to landowners in conserving and enhancing ecological value of grasslands while maintaining their suitability for grazing and other compatible uses. In response to long-term declines in grassland acreage and their associated benefits, approximately 524,000 acres have been enrolled since fiscal year 2003 in a variety of long-term rental agreements and easements. The program has proven popular with landowners.

Historical land use and management practices in the southeastern United States have resulted in the dominance of loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) on many upland sites that historically were occupied by longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.). There is currently much interest in restoring high quality longleaf pine habitats to such areas, but managers may also desire the retention of some existing canopy trees to meet current conservation objectives. However, fast-growing natural loblolly pine regeneration may threaten the success of artificially regenerated longleaf pine seedlings.

The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) manages one-fifth of the land in the United States, including public lands administered by the National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Land Management. Federal agencies have included public input in decision-making since the Administrative Procedure Act in 1946, with varying degrees of effectiveness. Recently, policy and reporting directives have broadened to include possibilities for collaborative conservation. Many disciplines are identifying this rise in collaboration as a new era of governance.

Pack and saddle stock, including, but not limited to domesticated horses, mules, and burros, are used to support commercial, private and administrative activities in the Sierra Nevada. The use of pack stock has become a contentious and litigious issue for land management agencies in the region inter alia due to concerns over effects on the environment.

Recognition of biochar as a potential tool for long-term carbon sequestration with additional agronomic benefits is growing. However, the functionality of biochar in soil and the response of soils to biochar inputs are poorly understood. It has been suggested, for example, that biochar additions to soils could prime for the loss of native organic carbon, undermining its sequestration potential. This work examines the priming potential of biochar in the context of its own labile fraction and procedures for their assessment.

Birds of agricultural systems are one of the most threatened groups of birds in Europe mainly due to their sharp population decline in recent decades. Habitat intensification resulting from more productive agricultural practices has been proposed as a major cause for these declines. However, especially in some regions such as Eastern European and Mediterranean countries, little is known about the ultimate factors linked to habitat intensification that drive population declines for different species.

Subsistence agriculture under rainfed conditions and declining or stagnant yields on irrigated farmland has raised concerns about resource management and long-term sustainability in the subtropical, semiarid region of India. Soil quality assessment has been recognized as an important step toward understanding the effects of land management practices within an agricultural watershed. This study addressed the spatial variability of soil properties and their quality at the watershed level using geostatistical methods.