ABSTRACT
Turfgrass industries worldwide have grown rapidly in recent decades. Current estimates place the land area planted to turfgrass in the United States at over 160,000 km2, an area three times larger than that of any irrigated crop [1]. Annual expenditure for turfgrass maintenance in the United States was estimated to be $45 billion in 1993, double the amount in 1985 [2]. This growth trend is also occurring in other rapidly developing countries, such as Australia and China [3,4].
