Producing 'greener' high-value sports turf through soil microbial management

总体目标是减少草皮对农药和化肥的依赖，在英国创造“更环保”、可持续的高质量草皮。我们的主要目标是确定运动草坪土壤微生物的最佳管理方法。我们将对运动草坪土壤取样，提取有益微生物并在CASE合作伙伴的实验室进行培养。然后，我们将研究如何将这些配方应用于运动草坪，以改善草坪状况。有4个相互关联的工作包，旨在回答以下问题：运动草坪的集约化管理制度是否损害了土壤微生物群落？对一系列运动草坪土壤取样将使我们也能描绘出可以生活在那里的微生物群落的特征。添加杀菌剂和肥料会减少菌根真菌的数量吗？2 .我们必须确定在施用农药时可能存在的微生物，以便将两者结合起来。土壤微生物群落资源有限吗？向土壤中添加碳将为微生物提供养分，并有可能克服由于迁移造成的限制。如何以可持续的方式将菌根和土壤细菌添加到草皮中？一系列的实地试验将试图确定合适的微生物，这些微生物可以被配制成商业产品。

The overall aim is to reduce the reliance of turf on pesticides and fertilizers and to create 'greener', sustainable high quality turf in the UK. Our main objective is to determine the optimum management methods for soil microbes in sports turf. We will sample sports turf soils, extract the beneficial microbes and culture them in the CASE partner's laboratory.We will then examine how these can be formulated to be applied to sports turf, so as to improve turf condition.There are 4 linked work packages, which aim to answer the following questions:1. Is the soil microbial community compromised by the intensive management regime on sports turf?Sampling a range of sports turf soils will enable us too characterise the communities of microbes that can live there.2. Does the addition fungicides and fertilizers reduce populations of mycorrhizal fungi?We have to identify the microbes that can exist with pesticide application so the two can be integrated.3. Is the soil microbial community resource-limited?Adding carbon to the soilwill feed the microbes and possibly overcome the limitation due to mowing.4. How can mycorrhizas and soil bacteria be added to turf in a sustainable manner?A series of field trials will try to identify appropriate microbes that could be formulated into a commercial product.