Using virtual irrigation to forecast disease
Poster presentation at the 2008 American Phytopathological Society meetings, July 26 - 30, Minneapolis, MN.
Authors: Larry Stowell and Wendy Gelernter (PACE Turfgrass Research Institute) and Frank Wong and Chi-Men Chen, University of California Riverside
Click here to view the poster (130 KB)
Summary: Recent research suggests that soil moisture impacts the severity of turf diseases such as anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum cereale, Pythium root dysfunction caused by Pythium volutum, gray leaf spot (GLS) caused by Magnaporthe grisea and brown ring patch (BRP) caused by Waitea circinata var. circinata. The virtual irrigation audit, a simple computer model that predicts the size and location of both wet and dry areas on golf course turf, was designed to provide diagnosticians and turf managers with a precision turfgrass management tool for disease and soil moisture management. In this study, the virtual audit was successfully used to describe the occurrence of GLS and BRP on golf course turf.