Use of Morphological Traits to Identify Turfgrass Collections Belonging to Three Commonly Used Species in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Turfgrass is the world’s leading ground cover and an essential component in landscaping. It is used mainly in lawns, sports fields, golf courses, and some other places where environmental adaptability, cultural needs, quality, and appearance rely on the correct identification of suitable turfgrass species. In most cases, there are no stable morphological characteristics that distinguish closely related grass species. Therefore, a morphological analysis was undertaken to address the misidentification of turfgrass species and morphological traits using eleven turfgrass collections belonging to genera Axonopus, Zoysia, and Cynodon. Morphological diversity among grass collections was evaluated using a descriptor prepared for grass weeds under plant house conditions. Fifteen morphological parameters were evaluated fifteen weeks after establishment. Parametric data were analyzed by one-way ANOVA for three different genera separately. Results revealed that the morphological parametric traits show significant differences (P<0.05) among turfgrass collections at the genus level. Moreover, the dendrograms obtained from the morphological analysis were clearly separated into three clusters. The dendrogram constructed by morphological data was again divided into sub-clusters, and eleven collections were separated individually, indicating that they are different from each other.