Slower-Growing Grass

Reported October 2008

BELLE GLADE, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Every weekend, about 54 million Americans mow their lawns -- using 800 million gallons of fuel each year. Research shows a standard gas-powered lawn mower produces as much air pollution as 43 new cars each being driven 12 thousand miles. That's a lot of gas, never mind the sweat and hard work! To address this problem, experts have developed a new type of grass that's cutting mowing needs in half -- and promising to make your neighbors green with envy.

It's one of life's necessary evils: you mow, you sweat -- and one week later, you do it all again.

"Just to keep up with the lawn every seven days with the rain -- if you don't cut it, it's going to overtake [you]," homeowner Stan Gill told Ivanhoe. "It's going to get ahead of you with the rain."

Gill has the most common grass in the Southeast in his yard -- St. Augustine. Now, horticulturist Russell Nagata, Ph.D. -- using his plant breeding specialty --has developed a new grass that should make life easier for him and other homeowners across the country.

Nagata has bred a much slower-growing type of St. Augustine grass called Captiva. In one week, typical grass grows three to five inches. Captiva grows between one-and-a-half and two-and-a-half inches.

"If you can eliminate a mowing, you will save fuel and wear and tear on your lawn mower," Dr. Nagata, a horticulturist at the University of Florida in Belle Glade, Fla., told Ivanhoe.

For example, in Florida, if you cut lawn mowing occurrences in half, Nagata estimates savings of up to 30 million gallons of fuel a year.

Captiva is also softer and a darker green than other types.

"The darker green the turf grass, the less likely people are going to be thinking 'I need to fertilize today," Dr. Nagata said.

That means less toxic runoff from over-fertilizing. As if that weren't enough, Captiva is resistant to chinch bugs.

"It's the most common insect problem that people have in St. Augustine lawns," Dr. Nagata said.

Captiva will be available starting this fall and found across the country within a year.

Click here to Go Inside This Science or contact:

Dr. Russell T. Nagata
Belle Glade, FL 33420
(561) 993-1557
nagata@ifas.ufl.edu

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