Review of Turfgrass Diseases: Golf Course Disease Updates by University Professors

As a student in the Golf Course Turfgrass Management Program at The Pennsylvania State University, I am particularly interested in the area of turfgrass pathology. I discovered the Turfgrass Diseases website, located at www.turfdiseases.blogspot.com, last semester while searching for additional reference material to support a turfgrass pathology course that we were taking at that time. The blog focuses on providing up-to-date information on turfgrass diseases that are affecting different areas of the country as well as a wonderful photo gallery that includes an array of turfgrass diseases.

The blog is supported by five individuals who are all specialists in turfgrass and plant pathology. They include: Dr. John Kaminski, Assistant Professor of Turfgrass Science at The Pennsylvania State University; Dr. Megan Kennelly, Assistant Professor of Plant Pathology at Kansas State University; Dr. Jim Kerns, Assistant Professor of Turfgrass Pathology at the University of Wisconsin; Dr. Lane Tredway, Associate Professor and Extension Specialist in the Department of Plant Pathology at North Carolina State University; and Dr. Frank Wong, Associate Specialist in Coop Extension and Associate Plant Pathologist at the University of California, Riverside.
Once you enter the blog, one can choose the area of the country that pertains to your situation. They have separated the country into five sections: Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, West, and South Central. Each of the experts reports current and relative information for their area of the country. For example, Dr. Kaminski writes on diseases relative to the northeastern United States.

The layout of the blog is attractive, well laid out, and surprisingly casual in feel. I say this because there are interesting caricatures of three of the experts on the homepage. In addition, the authors mix business with more familiar issues such as recent travels to the GIS Show in San Diego. A search engine is provided to easily find specific information on many diseases that have been written about in prior stories. As I said before, there is a wonderful photo gallery on the blog with amazing photos of many diseases. I hope that they continue adding to this section over time as it is a great current resource for managers of fine turf.

I would recommend this blog to anyone who is interested in turfgrass pathology as a means to network with university and industry experts as well as utilize the resources that they are providing. This is up-to-date, current information that could help the turfgrass manager on a daily basis in the pursuit of better managing their disease related issues.