New information on manganese and turf disease prevention

It has been known since the 1980s that applications of manganese can decrease the severity of diseases caused by the fungus Gaeumannomyces. Though the original research was done on diseases of wheat, we have applied those findings to turfgrass diseases such as take-all patch and decline with good results.

Now, a research team from Purdue University has advanced our understanding of this phenomenon. In a recent article in the journal Phytopathology, Ian Thompson and colleagues shed further light on exactly…