Pasture practices have affected Mediterranean forest ecosystems for millennia, and they are still quite widespread in mountainous areas. Nevertheless, in the last decades, the stability of forest ecosystems has been jeopardized due to the abandonment of traditional agro-pastoral practices, so that the gradual reduction of open areas due to progressive succession processes has caused a high increase of grazing pressure by livestock and wild ungulates feeding on forest areas. This paper aims at showing a methodological approach for evaluating the effect of applying measures in order to improve the grazing value of grasslands and ecotonal patches and lower the grazing impact on native woodlands. A protected area in Sicily (Italy) is considered as a representative case study. The analysis of remotely sensed imagery and several field surveys enabled to identify and map six different land use units subject to grazing, i.e., (1) forests; (2) grasslands (pastures dominated by palatable herbs and grasses); (3) overgrazed grasslands (dominated by poisonous and/or thorny herbs and forbs, not palatable); (4) encroached pastures; (5) roadside firebreaks (dominated by palatable herbs) with no shrubs; and (6) wooded/ encroached roadside firebreaks. Several data were collected through sample plots selected within each land use unit, in order to assess their pastoral value. These data have been used to define current and optimal animal stock rates aiming at addressing pasture management planning towards a sustainable use of forestland and shrubland.

Methods for carrying capacity estimation are standardised for pastoral resources, but in particular environments it is important to assess the potential utilisation of forests as forage source for grazing animals. Some experimental methods are money and time consuming and they need the accurate evaluation of production from woody species that can be utilised by animals. This work suggests a simplified methodology of vegetation sampling to be used inside forest planning to evaluate the carrying capacity of woods. The proposed technique needs the determination of a maximum animal stocking rate and the assessment of herbaceous and woody vegetation and their palatability to evaluate the eventual occurrence of negative parameters to be taken into account as reductive factors of the maximum stocking rate previously identified. The research was carried out inside the forest planning of the complex “Gallipoli-Cognato” (Basilicata). About 100 sample areas were conducted to assess the woody and the herbaceous layers present in the forest. Based on these findings, three classes of overall forage quality were identified and to them a different and decreasing level of potential stocking rate was attributed, starting from the maximum that for the studied area was considered as 0.3 LU ha-1 year-1. Proposed methodology resulted simple and fast, even if some improvements are necessary concerning the evaluation of the herbaceous vegetation and the assessment of the damages caused by animals grazing to soil and forest.