Abstract
Wear damage is one of the biggest problems associated with continuous use on sports and recreational turfgrass fields. Wear tolerance of 8 bermudagrass (Cynodon spp.) genotypes including 6 ecotypes collected from regional Australia and two commercial cultivars were evaluated in the field. Green cover after wear treatment of ecotypes 394 and MED3 was over 50% higher than the lowest genotypes. The wear tolerant genotypes also had significantly higher acid detergent fibre content, cellulose, lignin and total cell wall content than wear susceptible genotypes. Optical and scanning electron microscopies were used to study stolon and leaf transverse sections and leaf surface characteristics, respectively. Transverse sections of stolons and leaves, suggested that the fibre area surrounding vascular bundles of the wear tolerant genotypes was about 50% higher than the wear susceptible ones. Scanning electron micrographs of the leaf surface suggested that the arrangement of epidermal cells formed a ridged pattern. The gaps between the ridges of wear tolerant genotypes were shorter than those of the wear susceptible genotypes. Collectively, these results suggested that the mechanism of wear tolerance was associated with high fibre content in stolons and leaves. In addition, we suggest that the wear tolerant genotypes have a denser ridge pattern of epidermal cells probably giving the leaves greater tensile strength.
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