Environmental Studies Theses and Dissertations

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Browsing Environmental Studies Theses and Dissertations by Subject "Agroecology"

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    Ecological Intensification of Oregon Hazelnut Orchards: Restoring Native Plant Communities in Shared Ecosystems
    (University of Oregon, 2024-08-07) Lane-Massee, Marissa; Hallett, Lauren
    The rapidly expanding Oregon hazelnut industry offers a unique opportunity for restoring ecosystem services to private lands that were historically oak-prairie dominated habitats. With typical orchard management consisting of bare-soil orchard floors, ecological intensification through the use of native conservation cover may directly benefit farmers and their operations, saving time and money spent on land management. With the hazelnut industry currently investing resources into young orchards, soil management with cover crops has become a contentious point of research. Looking towards the future, understanding how cover crops can be tailored towards an expanding and aging Oregon hazelnut industry is imperative. Here, I study the feasibility of large-scale native conservation cover implementation in a mature orchard, with measurements of compatibility to orchard management practices and desirable ecosystem services that farmers can directly utilize. My results show that native conservation cover can successfully suppress orchard weeds, align with important pest management timeframes, facilitate hazelnut pickup during wet harvest years, reduce chemical and mechanical inputs, and while not having a significant effect on soil moisture, significantly reducing soil temperature during summer months. This study demonstrates the feasibility and compatibility for native conservation cover to be used in commercial hazelnut systems, and the capacity at which native conservation cover directly benefits the farmer and agroecosystem alike.
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    Farming and Meaning at the Desert's Edge: Can Serer Indigenous Agricultural and Cultural Systems Coevolve Towards Sustainability?
    (University of Oregon, 2018-09-06) Faye, Jean; Galvan, Dennis
    Indigenous agroforestry systems, or the intentional use of trees and livestock in croplands, have a long history in the West African Sahel. In many locations, they have long contributed to food security and climate change resilience. But a century or more of cash cropping and use of modern agricultural inputs and tools has meant that no such agroforestry systems remain intact, and many are extinct, including in west-central Senegal, where the Serer historic mixed farming and pastoral strategies previously provided resilience to cyclical droughts and colonial-era agricultural and economic change but are now neither intact nor extinct. This study examines the current state of Serer agroecosystems, considering who uses what elements of the old systems, who has introduced what elements of nonindigenous farming systems, and whether this combination of local and imported farming systems is a coherent and sustainable fusion, or an incoherent pastiche leading toward agrarian collapse. I argue that, depending on how farmers integrate new models with the technical and cultural elements of the old system, a coherent fusion may result, with positive implications for sustainability, climate change adaptation, soil replenishment, crop yield, and livelihood resilience. This mixed-methods study draws upon literature from cultural ecology, agroecology, socioecological resilience, and history to interpret farmers’ accounts of changing agrarian practices. The study links ethnographic findings to empirical analysis of soil conditions and land use change. With these tools, my research sheds new light on the evolving role of local techniques and knowledge in the struggle to maintain agricultural productivity, as Sahelian communities confront soil fertility depletion, food insecurity, and climate change. The study finds that farming communities in this region can strengthen their livelihood resilience and enhance crop yields if they update elements of the well-adapted historic farming system, employ new techniques and tools, and in the process, forge coherent farming systems that still make cultural sense to farmers.