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Minimal Water Requirements Of Cool-Season Turfgrasses For Survival And Recovery After Prolonged Drought, Mu Hong, Dale Bremer, Steve Keeley

Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Reports

Sodded tall fescue (TF) and Kentucky bluegrass (KBG) turfgrasses were exposed to prolonged drought at several levels of deficit irrigation from 0% to 50% of reference evapotranspiration (ET) within the first year of establishment. Tall fescue watered at 40% and 50% ET maintained minimally acceptable performance longer during the dry-down phases and recovered faster after rewatering than lower ET treatments. Tall fescue with no water input (0% ET) maintained minimally acceptable performance for about 5 weeks, which was longer than KBG watered at 50% ET, which remained acceptable for less than 3 weeks during the dry down. Although KBG watered …