Diversity and incidence of plant-parasitic nematodes in Belgian turf grass

Eleven golf courses and eight football pitches, located in Belgium, were surveyed for plant-parasitic nematodes. This revealed a remarkably high diversity: 52 different species/taxa were identified morphologically, belonging to 23 genera and nine families. Among the most prevalent nematodes on both sports field types were Helicotylenchus pseudorobustus and Meloidogyne naasi (> 85% and > 45% of the analysed samples, respectively). Golf greens contained a higher density and diversity of cyst nematodes than football fields. Cyst nematode species included Punctodera punctata, Heterodera mani, H. ustinovi, H. bifenestra and H. hordecalis. Multivariate statistics of the first three species showed that they could be separated based on morphometrical characters of juveniles, but not on values based on the vulva! pattern. Several detected species, e.g., Meloidogyne minor, are a potential source of infestation of agricultural fields. This study shows the importance of plant-parasitic nematodes in turf grass in temperate Europe. In addition, a comparison between two extraction methods revealed that significantly more nematodes were extracted with the zonal centrifuge than after 2 weeks extraction with the Baermann method, except for juveniles of Meloidogyne spp. and cyst-forming species.