Marloth Park Management Plan. - Nkomazi Local Municipality

Recommendations

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• The destruction of plants and small animals during construction works. • The creation of erosion problems leading to habitat deterioration. • That animals use roads as routes between watering points and grazing areas. • That animals such as impala and blue wildebeest sleep on roads during rainy or moonless nights. • The attraction of hares and steenbok to pioneer plants along roadsides. • That snakes often lie on roads when the environmental temperatures are low. • That ground-nesting birds often breed next to roads. • The provision of water out of season by quarries near roads, which can lead to over-utilisation of certain areas. Roads are constructed for four main reasons: Tourism, hunting, maintenance and firebreaks. The most important purpose for Marloth Park is to provide owners access to their properties and to give maintenance personnel access to all areas. A secondary benefit of the roads is for viewing wildlife and experiencing nature on Marloth Park. The current road infrastructure is well developed and traverses all vegetation types and plant communities, giving access to a diversity of habitats. For roads to be used as effective firebreaks a minimum width of 8 m is generally recommended. The only two roads that current comply with this recommendation is Olifants Drive and Renoster Road. Recommendations for Marloth Park The road network on Marloth Park is highly developed, and no new roads need to be constructed. However, some of these roads need maintenance, especially after the rainfall season. It is recommended that water run-off be improved, and woody vegetation be removed for a distance of not less that 1 m, and not more that 2 m from the edge of the road. This will reduce the potential of accidental collision with antelope that want to cross the roads, and act as a more effective barrier against runaway wildfires. ADAPTIVE MANAGEMENT AND MONITORING Adaptive management is a term used to describe the system of making management decisions based on past mistakes. It is a useful management tool where decisions need to be made without having all the scientific facts. Adaptive management depends on three important monitoring programmes. • Measuring the performance of animals • Measure the change in vegetation • Recording environmental condition © Ecological Associates/ Marloth Park 119
Adaptive management Applying adaptive management require baseline data that can be used as a reference system in measuring change. This study will thus serve as reference system for future management decisions. By monitoring these changes, the effects of applied management can be gauged. However, no management decision can be made without clear set objectives. Periodically, fixed points on Marloth Park must be surveyed and the veld condition compared to the initial baseline data gathered. If any degradation is occurred in that time period, management decisions, such as stocking rate, must be re-evaluated and adjusted to achieve the objective or desired results. A new management decision must then be applied and the process repeated. If this process continues long enough a model specifically adapted to Marloth Park can be devised. It is crucial that adequate records be kept on all aspects of veld and wildlife management. Without adequate records constructive progress will be vague and unsubstantiated. Monitoring Monitoring of the habitat aims at purposeful and repeated examination of the state or condition of the veld that involves the frequent testing for differences between baseline data or initial surveys and follow-up surveys. Certain components of the habitat can be regarded as key components as they are indicators of change. These components are rainfall, soil erosion, permanent surface water, fire, vegetation structure, cover and composition, animal productivity, numbers and growth rate. Rainfall Long-term rainfall is important for determining trends of change in vegetation. Rainfall has the greatest influence on the productivity of vegetation and ecological capacity. Although rainfall should ideally be recorded on Marloth Park, sufficiently reliable data can be obtained from the weather station on Malelane. Habitat To conduct monitoring surveys of the habitat, fixed survey sites should be established on Marloth Park, in each of the plant communities. Veld condition should then be measured and evaluated against the existing baseline data. Game The seasonal distribution and numbers of game should be monitored continually and population growth rates calculated. These can then be used to determine the health of the population. © Ecological Associates/ Marloth Park 120
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Ecological Associates Environmental
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THE ASSESSMENT OF AVAILABLE BROWSE
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LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Location
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LIST OF APPENDICES Appendix 1: A li
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Three different scenarios are analy
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Ecosystems disturbed by clearing op
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INTRODUCTION Although only a few ve
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Figure 1: Location of the Marloth P
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GEOMORPHOLOGY Looking down from the
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Figure 4: Geology of the Marloth Pa
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Tonalitic granite and gneiss A sect
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Figure 6: Soil depth of the Marloth
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Figure 7: Land Types of the Marloth
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Figure 8: Land use in the Marloth P
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A 610.1 B 104.0 C 7.4 D 19.9 E 39.8
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INTRODUCTION VEGETATION CLASSIFICAT
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METHOD For an initial and broad sca
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RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Analysis and
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The dominant grass species are broa
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The characteristic tree species are
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VELD CONDITION ASSESSMENT AND THE C
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Degradation gradients are models th
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The nearest grass species to each s
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Calculation of grazing capacity The
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Table 2: Contribution of ecological
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Table 3: Grazing capacities for the
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THE ASSESSMENT OF AVAILABLE BROWSE
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X Y D1 Y Dimensional measurements:
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RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The browsing
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Table 6: Browsing capacities for th
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INTRODUCTION ESTIMATION OF HERBACEO
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The resulting Large Stock Units are
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INTRODUCTION GAME MANAGEMENT ON MAR
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STOCKING RATES Current stocking The
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Table 10: The current stocking dens
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Recommendations on stocking rates C
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High selectivity grazers Blue wilde
Page 75 and 76: Waterbuck Kobus ellipsiprymnus Ogil
Page 77 and 78: Space requirements: Kudu have range
Page 79 and 80: Recommendation: The range requireme
Page 81 and 82: Food preference: Steenbok utilise A
Page 83 and 84: Table 12: The potential stocking de
Page 85 and 86: Table 14: The potential stocking de
Page 87 and 88: Table 15: The recommended stocking
Page 89 and 90: The proteins may be less available
Page 91 and 92: When urea is incorporated into a ph
Page 93 and 94: Recommended intake for game is 150
Page 95 and 96: Ticks The main parasite of concern
Page 97 and 98: Figure 12: Sketch of Cyphostemma /C
Page 99 and 100: NOXIOUS AND INVASIVE WEEDS An invas
Page 101 and 102: Management plans need to be reviewe
Page 103 and 104: Ricinus communis, Solanum sisymbrii
Page 105 and 106: Although soil treatment with chemic
Page 107 and 108: Planning errors must be expected, a
Page 109 and 110: To further reduce grazing pressure
Page 111 and 112: Lightning induced fires can also ca
Page 113 and 114: TIME OF BURNING Least damage is cau
Page 115 and 116: A low intensity fire will be achiev
Page 117 and 118: Recommendations for Marloth Park Ma
Page 119 and 120: Surface erosion will reduce water i
Page 121 and 122: Several different types of waterhol
Page 123 and 124: Stones Ground level Reinforced conc
Page 125: For safety reasons these requiremen
Page 129 and 130: Figure 15: Location of the monitori
Page 131 and 132: Appendix 1 (Continue) A list of tre
Page 133 and 134: Appendix 2 (Continue) A list of gra
Page 135 and 136: Appendix 3 (Continue) A list of for
Page 137 and 138: Appendix 3 (Continue) A list of for
Page 139 and 140: Appendix 4: Alien invaders found on
Page 141 and 142: Appendix 5: Frequency occurrence of
Page 155 and 156: Appendix 6: Photographs of each veg
Page 157 and 158: Appendix 6: Photographs of each veg
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Marloth Park Management Plan. - Nkomazi Local Municipality

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