The total biomass of a tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea var. Fletcher) pasture was assessed by using a vehicle mounted light detection and ranging (LiDAR) unit to derive canopy height and an active optical reflectance sensor to determine the spectro-optical reflectance index, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). In a random plot design, measurements of NDVI and pasture height were com...

Biotechnology approaches can supplement conventional breeding efforts for turfgrass improvement. The objective of this study was to develop reliable transformation and selection schemes for elite turf-type tall fescue cultivars. Transgenic tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea Schreb.) plants were obtained by microprojectile bombardment of embryogenic suspension cells of two elite turf-type cultivar...

ABSTRACT Stenotrophomonas maltophilia strain C3 was evaluated for control of leaf spot on tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea) caused by Bipolaris sorokiniana. In growth chamber experiments, C3 inhibited conidial germination on leaf surfaces and reduced lesion frequency and percent diseased leaf area compared with nontreated controls. The amount of leaf spot suppression was related to the C3 dose ...

Soils vary widely in mineral nutrient availability and physical characteristics, but the influence of this variability on plant responses to elevated CO2 remains poorly understood. As a first approximation of the effect of global soil variability on plant growth response to CO2, we evaluated the effect of CO2 on tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea) grown in soils representing 10 of the 12 global s...

Mutualistic fungal endophytes infect many grass species and often confer benefits to the hosts such as reduced herbivory by insects and animals. The physiological interactions between the endophytes and their hosts have not been well characterized. Fungal-secreted proteins are likely to be important components of the interaction. In the interaction between Poa ampla and the endophyte Neotyphodi...

Tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea Schreb.) is widely utilized as a major forage and turfgrass species in the temperate regions of the world and is a valuable plant material for studying molecular mechanisms of grass stress tolerance due to its superior drought and heat tolerance among cool-season species. Selection of suitable reference genes for quantification of target gene expression is impor...

A method has been developed to prepare fresh forages for in sacco and in vitro incubation by freezing and mincing to achieve a particle size distribution of dry matter (DM) similar to in vivo conditions. The method is described and data presented to indicate losses of nitrogen (N) during in sacco digestion and net yield of ammonia from proteolysis in vitro for 22 fresh and conserved forages. Gr...

Tunisian tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea Schreb.) is an important grass for forages or soil conservation, particularly in marginal sites. Inter-simple sequence repeats were used to estimate genetic diversity within and among 8 natural populations and 1 cultivar from Northern Tunisia. A total of 181 polymorphic inter-simple sequence repeat markers were generated using 7 primers. Shannon's index...

The objective of the following experiments was to examine the effect of dried distillers grains plus solubles (DDGS) supplementation of calves grazing bermudagrass (Cynodon dactylon) pasture during summer (Exp. 1) or fed lowquality tall fescue hay (Exp. 2, Festuca arundinacea) during winter months. In Exp. 1, a total of 36 steers (261 kg) were randomly assigned to one of nine 0.81-ha pastures r...