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a Dep. of Plant Biology and Pathology, Rutgers Univ., 59 Dudley Rd., Foran Hall, New Brunswick, NJ, 08901-8520
b Turf Merchants Inc., 33390 Tangent Loop, Tangent, OR, 97389
c NexGen Research Inc., 33725 Columbus St. SE, Albany, OR 97321
* Corresponding author (bonos{at}aesop.rutgers.edu).
ABSTRACT
Apomictic reproduction makes breeding Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis L.) challenging. It is often difficult to identify a cultivar with the right combination of traits that will be successful in the marketplace. ‘Bedazzled’ Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis L.) (Reg. No. CV-94, PI 631168) is a turf-type cultivar released by Turf Merchants Inc., Tangent, OR, in 2002. It was selected as an open-pollinated progeny of ‘Unique’ Kentucky bluegrass. Bedazzled is comparable to ‘Midnight’ Kentucky bluegrass (the top industry standard) in many characteristics, including turf quality and disease resistance; however, Bedazzled has significantly better spring green-up compared to Midnight. This combination of traits makes Bedazzled a unique, widely adapted, functional cultivar that should perform well on home lawns, athletic fields, parks, and golf courses in the Northeast, North Central and Intermountain West regions of the United States.
Abbreviations: NTEP, National Turfgrass Evaluation Program
Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis L.) reproduces through an asexual process called apomixis. In this process, seed formed by apomictic reproduction is genetically identical to the seed-bearing "mother" plant. Apomixis is therefore an excellent means of maintaining hybrid vigor and genetic purity of a cultivar from one generation to the next (Huff, 2003). This results in many cultivars of Kentucky bluegrass with unique combinations of agronomic and morphological characteristics. Although beneficial for seed production and cultivar propagation, apomixis has challenged breeders in their effort to generate new variation and incorporate all of the important characteristics into one cultivar.
‘Midnight’ Kentucky bluegrass (Meyer et al., 1984) has been the top standard in the industry for the past 25 years. It is characterized as a cultivar with excellent turfgrass quality, dark green color, and good resistance to several fungal pathogens but, it is late to green up in the springtime. This is a problem for athletic field programs with spring-time sporting events. The industry would benefit from a cultivar with a combination of characteristics that exhibits excellent turf quality and greens up early in the springtime. ‘Bedazzled’ Kentucky bluegrass (Reg. No. CV-94, PI 631168) contains these combined characteristics. Bedazzled is a turf-type cultivar released by Turf Merchants Inc., Tangent, OR, in 2002. Germplasm obtained from the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station was used in the development of Bedazzled. It was tested as A97-1400. The first Certified seed was produced in 2002. Bedazzled was selected because it exhibited improved turf quality compared with ‘Unique’ Kentucky bluegrass as well as the combination of improved turf quality, early spring green-up, and improved disease resistance. This unique combination of traits makes Bedazzled a useful cultivar for turfgrass managers throughout the temperate regions of the United States.
Methods
Bedazzled appears to have originated as a single, apomictic plant selected from the open-pollinated progeny of Unique Kentucky bluegrass (Rose-Fricker et al., 1999). Unique is a vigorous, apomictic plant that originated from a plant collected from an old turf area in Exeter, RI, in 1987. A typical plant of Unique was open pollinated by typical plants of SR 2109 and selections identified as A82-1091, A82-1095, and H86-788, which were collections typical of ‘Cheri’. The cross occurred during the late winter of 1994–1995 in a greenhouse located on the Cook College campus of Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ. Environmental conditions before and during pollination were modified to increase sexual reproduction of facultatively apomictic Kentucky bluegrasses (Bashaw and Funk, 1987; Hintzen and van Wijk, 1985; Pepin and Funk, 1971). Seed from the Unique female parent was harvested in spring 1995. Seedlings were grown in the greenhouse in winter 1995–1996, and hybrids were phenotypically identified. Selected hybrid plants were established in a spaced-plant nursery at the Rutgers University Plant Science Research and Extension Farm at Adelphia, NJ, during spring 1996. The following summer, an attractive F1 hybrid plant was harvested from this nursery with the designation 96-2341-3. In fall 1997, seed from the F1 hybrid plant, 96-2341-3, was used to plant a turf plot at Adelphia, NJ, with the designation A97-1400. A97-1400 is 90% apomictic observed from tillers grown from the original turf plot with good floret fertility and an inflorescence number rating of 6 (on a 1–9 scale, where 9 = most inflorescences). In 1998, a seed increase block containing 1513 spaced-plants was established. In spring 1999, 185 (12%) plants were removed. The remaining plants were harvested in bulk and designated A97-1400 Breeder seed. In Breeder and Foundation seed multiplications and turf plots Bedazzled Kentucky bluegrass is a stable, uniform cultivar. Neither off-type or variant plants have been observed in the multiplication process.
Bedazzled was evaluated for morphological characteristics in a nursery established in September 1999, in Albany, OR. The experiment included 22 entries arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Twenty plants per replication were evaluated, for a total of 60 plants per entry. ‘Baron’, ‘America’, and Unique were used as standards. Plants were established on 0.76-m centers with a skip row between replications and between entries. Means were calculated for each replication and then analyzed. Data was analyzed using analysis of variance for a randomized complete block design (Tables 1 and 2 ).
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Characteristics
Bedazzled is an improved turf-type medium-low growing Kentucky bluegrass. It is later in maturity than Baron but earlier than Unique and America (Tables 1 and 2). Early seed maturity is a beneficial characteristic because seed can be produced economically without supplemental irrigation or under dryland conditions where supplemental irrigation is not available (Bashaw and Funk, 1987). Bedazzled also has a longer panicle (uppermost node to apex) and wider leaf blade compared with Unique and America (Tables 1 and 2). These characteristics make it distinct from the maternal parent.
Bedazzled performed well in the NTEP test seeded in 2000 at 33 locations in the United States (Morris, 2006). It exhibited excellent turf quality at high, medium, and low maintenance (Table 3 ) (Morris, 2006). From the turf-quality data, Bedazzled is comparable to Midnight Kentucky bluegrass, which has been the top cultivar for the past 25 years. In addition to high turf quality, Bedazzled also exhibits excellent resistance to dollar spot (caused by the fungus Sclerotinia homoeocarpa) and stripe smut (caused by the fungus Ustilago striiformis) diseases (Table 3) and very good resistance to leaf spot [caused by the fungus Drechslera poae (Baudys) Shoem] and summer patch (caused by Magnaporthe poae) diseases (Table 3) (Morris, 2006). Bedazzled exhibits comparable disease resistance to Midnight. However, Midnight exhibits relatively slow spring green-up. Bedazzled exhibits early green-up in the springtime (Table 3; Bonos et al., 2004) and is significantly better than Midnight for this characteristic.
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Enough genetic diversity exists within Kentucky bluegrass to find resistance to almost every stress and pathogen that plagues the species. The most difficult challenge in breeding Kentucky bluegrass is incorporating all the important traits into a single cultivar. The combination of characteristics that Bedazzled contains (excellent turf quality, very good disease resistance to several important pathogens, early seed maturity, and early spring green-up) makes this new cultivar unique and useful for many different turf situations. Bedazzled can be used for home lawns, parks, athletic fields, recreation and conservation areas in temperate climates. It performed very well in NTEP trials (Morris, 2006) and therefore is recommended for use in the Northeast, North Central, and Intermountain region of the western United States.
Availability
Breeder seed is maintained by NexGen Research Inc., and Foundation and Certified seed are maintained by Turf Merchants, Inc. Certified seed propagation is restricted to three generations of Breeder seed: one each of Foundation, Registered, and Certified. Plant Variety Protection Certificate (PVP no. 200200140) has been issued for Bedazzled Kentucky bluegrass. Contact the corresponding author for all seed requests. Recipients are asked to recognize the source if it contributes to the development of a cultivar or germplasm or is used for other research purposes. Seed will be deposited in the National Plant Germplasm System (NPGS), but no seed will be distributed by the NPGS without written permission for 20 years from the date of publication in the Journal of Plant Registrations, at which time seed will also be available from the NPGS.
Footnotes
All rights reserved. No part of this periodical may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Permission for printing and for reprinting the material contained herein has been obtained by the publisher.
Received for publication September 14, 2008.
References
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