4. Results
4.1. Effect of altitude and soil erosion indicators on measured
botanical parameters
Table 1 shows that soil erosion and soil compactionwere present
in all regions, but increased with decreasing altitude (P < 0.05).
Increased soil erosion and soil compaction coincided with a deterioration
of the plant species composition, plant species richness, the
basal and litter cover, the number of seedlings and the age distribution
of the herbaceous layer (P < 0.05). Similar to the grazable vegetation,
the woody vegetation parameters decreased with decreasing
altitude, including hedging, canopy cover and wood density
(P < 0.05). Utilization of the rangeland vegetationwas highest in the
LAR, lowest in the HAR and intermediate in the MAR (P < 0.05).
4.2. Effect of altitude and soil erosion indicators on perceived
numerical parameters of cattle performance
For most parameters of cattle performance, the LAR scored
worse in comparison to the other regions (Table 2). The HAR
showed the best performance, whereas the MAR was either similar
to the HAR or intermediate for the calculated parameters. Calving