BENTGRASS RESPONSE AND ROOTZONE MIXES PROPERTIES AS AFFECTED BY THE AMENDMENT OF VARIOUS TREATED ORGANIC WASTES

Many organic amendments have been tested to improve sand root zone mixes in the past. As technology improves, a lot of waste products, which had been treated as potentially hazardous, can be converted into economically feasible and environmentally friendly materials. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the physical and chemical properties of sand mixes amended with various treated waste products and to examine the response of bentgrasses on these materials. The experiment consisted of four different sand mixes. These sand mixes were amended with Canadian sphagnum peat moss (CSP) as a check, steer manure, biosolids, and a mix of steer manure and CSP. Four bentgrass varieties were tested: Penncross, Penn A-4, Crenshaw, and L93. Results revealed that sand mix added with steer manure had the best turf quality, followed by sand mix amended with steer manure and peat moss. However, no significant difference was found between the two. Results also revealed that CSP had the lowest turf quality score and the rating was significantly different from the other sand mixes. Overall, L93 bentgrass had the highest quality rating on both sand mixes amended with steer manure alone and steer manure with peat moss.