Estimating Aboveground Net Primary Production in Grassland- and Herbaceous-Dominated Ecosystems

Although grass- and herb-dominated ecosystems may be easier to sample for aboveground primary production than most others, a variety of challenges for standardizing approaches in different settings and circumstances must be overcome. This chapter describes the most common harvest approaches for grassland production measurement and a suite of site-specific criteria that affect the choice of approach (e.g., grazing, decomposition, phenology). Errors leading to either underestimation or overestimation are examined, and a case study describing approaches for evaluating sample adequacy is provided.