COVER STORY
USING RESULTS from the NATIONAL TURFGRASS EVALUATION PROGRAM (NTEP) By Dave Han, Ph.D., Auburn University and Alabama Extension
The
National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP) is a fantastic source for information on newly-released and upcoming turfgrass varieties. Since 1983, NTEP has been evaluating turfgrass varieties and making data from those variety trials available for free to the public. A survey of turfgrass managers published in 2019 determined that 87% of the 306 respondents to the survey had heard of the NTEP program. At the same time, over half of the respondents (52%) said they visited the NTEP (www.ntep.org) website to look at trial results either never or less than once per year (Yue et al., 2019). Could NTEP be used more? I think so. I personally use their data many times per year, but along the way I have developed some tricks and tools to help me get the most out of what sometimes seems to be an overwhelming mountain of numbers. So let’s take a quick tour of NTEP, what it is and how it works, and how to find what you need from their data reports.
HOW NTEP WORKS NTEP is a non-profit cooperative effort between the U.S. Department of Agriculture, state universities, and turfgrass industry groups. The variety trials that NTEP sponsors, cover the most commonly-used turfgrasses (both cool season and warm season, see Table 1) in the United States. Trials typically run for five years, and are called by the year they were established. For example, the 2013 National Bermudagrass Test was planted in 2013 and contains data from the 2013–2017 growing seasons. The currently-running bermudagrass trial is the 2019 National Bermudagrass Test, which was established in 2019. Tests are established at many sites throughout the regions where a particular species will grow. Typically, there are around 10 – 15 sites, though this varies with each test. The sites are usually associated with research universities – for example, at our main research facility in Auburn, Auburn University has the current bermudagrass
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and zoysiagrass NTEP trials. We also had the just-finished 2016 St. Augustinegrass trail and established a bentgrass trial this fall. In the past, we have also run NTEP tests at outlying research units, such as a tall fescue trial at the Sand Mountain Research and Extension Center in northeastern Alabama. Occasionally, NTEP will place tests on-site, especially for tests on putting greens. NTEP also ran a perennial ryegrass overseed trial, with locations on golf course fairways. For on-site tests, the golf course maintains the tests day-to-day, and university researchers typically evaluate the tests the same way they do on-campus ones.
TABLE 1. NTEP tests data are available for these species
COOL SEASON
WARM SEASON
Creeping bentgrass (putting greens)
Bermudagrass
Creeping bentgrass (fairways/tees)
Buffalograss
Fineleaf fescues
Zoysiagrass
Kentucky bluegrass
St. Augustinegrass
Perennial ryegrass
Seashore paspalum
Tall fescue
TENNESSEE TURFGRASS DECEMBER / JANUARY 2022 Email TTA at: info@ttaonline.org
