Spatiotemporal Relationship of Plant and Soil Properties on Natural Turfgrass Sports Fields.

Understanding the spatiotemporal relationship of natural turfgrass sports field properties may aid in the promotion and implementation of precision turfgrass management (PTM). Correlation coefficients and spatial maps were utilized to evaluate the spatiotemporal relationship of several sports field properties of two natural turfgrass sports fields comprised of native (sandy loam) and sand capped (sand) soils before and after irrigation. Soil moisture (volumetric water content; VWC), soil compaction (penetration resistance), turfgrass vigor (normalized difference vegetative index; NDVI), surface hardness, and turfgrass shear strength data were obtained before and after irrigation, as well as thatch depth, root biomass [total (0-12.7 cm), upper (0-5.1 cm), and lower (5.1-12.7 cm) depths], and soil texture (sand, silt, and clay). Minimal temporal differences in spatial variability were observed when comparing before to after irrigation. Only the magnitude of VWC, penetration resistance, and surface hardness was significantly (P<0.01) affected on each field. Several relationships between properties were significant at both locations (P<0.05), but the strongest relationships were between VWC, penetration resistance, NDVI, and surface hardness of the native soil field. This resulted in similar spatial distributions among the properties. Significant relationships on the sand capped field were weak to moderate and the most comparable maps existed between VWC and turfgrass shear strength, and penetration resistance and surface hardness. These results were used to discuss several practical PTM applications that may improve the spatiotemporal variability of natural turfgrass sports fields.