AJRFS SPECIAL ISSUE
Karoo Special Issue -
African Journal of Range
and Forage Science
Reprinted From: http://bit.ly/2SsQmVG
I
t has been nearly 20 years since Dr W
Richard J Dean and Dr Suzanne J Mil-
ton published an edited volume con-
cerning southern Africa’s drylands and
over a decade since a research journal
has dedicated one of its issues to the
Karoo.
The Karoo Special Issue (KSI), published
in African Journal of Range and Forage
Science, Volume 35, Issue 3 & 4 is thus a
truly influential issue.
The Karoo is an arid to semi-arid area
across the western third of South Africa,
comprising the Succulent Karoo and Na-
ma-Karoo biomes. Its environment and
people have experienced considerable
changes, and now face new challenges
as the Anthropocene unfolds.
The Anthropocene relates to the current
geological age during which human ac-
tivity has been the dominant influence
on climate and the environment.
The special issue brings together new
information in 20 papers, a mixture of re-
views, research articles and commentar-
ies, significantly adding to the previous
syntheses of Karoo knowledge.
While previous ecological research on
land-use practices in the Karoo has em-
phasised the impact of grazing by do-
mestic livestock on vegetation, the KSI
brings an historical depth to this use that
has rarely been highlighted before, to-
gether with an analysis of several new
data sets that have hitherto not been
explored extensively.
The issue is also a multi-disciplinary is-
sue.
Dedicated to Dr Suzanne J Milton and
Dr W Richard J Dean the KSI papers,
many of which were written by their col-
leagues, friends or former students, rep-
resents a Festschrift that celebrates and
honours their research as well as the in-
spiration and leadership they have to a
generation of scientists.
The special issue can be accessed here:
http://bit.ly/2SYclJv.
Grassroots
Vol 19
No 1
Figure 1: The special issue of the African Journal of Range and Forage Science
was published in November 2018.
March 2019
06