Buffalograss Tere has not been sufficient interest to start a new
buffalograss trial, therefore, the data that we compiled from 2002-2006 is the most recent we have available. Considering the four years of data from the 2002 trial, cultivar performance depended mainly on geographical location. Te vegetative cultivar Density had high quality ratings in the southern locations of Tucson, AZ, Riverside, CA, and Dallas, TX, with lower turfgrass quality ratings, relative to other entries, at more northern locations. Legacy, another vegetative entry, had the highest quality rating at Logan, UT, Manhattan, KS, and Lincoln, NE. Several seeded entries again performed well during the trial period, with Tech Turfgrass 1 and Bowie each performing well at more than one location. In addition, Tech Turfgrass 1, Density, and SWI 2000 were consistently the fastest to establish. A few buffalograss cultivars have been released
since our last NTEP trial was initiated, two of those cultivars from the University of Nebraska. Prestige is a commercially available vegetative cultivar released in 2003. And most recently, the University of Nebraska released the seeded cultivar Sundancer.
Water Use Trials under rain exclusion shelters, such as this one shown in Griffin, GA, in July of 2021, evaluate cultivar efficiency and performance during extended periods of restricted irrigation.
Centipedegrass Centipedegrass performs well in the more acidic,
dense soils of the southeast U.S. and does so with probably the least maintenance required of any warm-season species. Curiously though, improved centipedegrass cultivars have been slow to become commercialized. In fact, NTEP has never tested centipedegrass due to the lack of a significant number of cultivars available. Seeded centipedegrass cultivars are dwarfed in the marketplace by common centipede, the major centipedegrass seed sold. One of the few improved cultivars, TifBlair, reportedly more cold- tolerant than other cultivars, has been commercialized within the last several years.
Searching for new improved varieties takes place in the lab and then in research plots like these at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Photo by Steve Trusty.
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Kevin Morris is executive director of the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP).
All photos by Kevin Morris unless otherwise noted. TPI Turf News July/August 2022
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