UC Healthy Lawns—Choosing and identifying your turf species

UC IPM Online

The UC Guide to Healthy Lawns

Choose and identify your turf species

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Use this key to identify your grass species

Click on illustrations that resemble your grass characteristics.
Work through the key until you get to a summary page of your grass with links to management tips.

Identification tips

Importance of identifying turfgrasses

It is important to recognize turfgrass species commonly used for home lawns or around parks and schools. Failure to properly identify a turfgrass species can lead to mistakes in maintenance. For example, not all turfgrass species tolerate the same mowing height or frequency. Irrigation frequency and the amount of water needed vary among species as do the frequency and amount of fertilizer. Turfgrasses also differ in how they adapt to sun, shade, and temperature. Most lawns are mixtures of various turfgrass species.

For more information on specific adaptations and tolerances, see the following tables for turfgrass species that are

See the following publication for more information:

"Turfgrass Selection for the Home Landscape" (PDF* 100K)

*Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader version 4 or later. If this software is not installed on your computer, download a free copy of Acrobat Reader.

Already know your turf species? Learn key qualities, identification characteristics, and management tips of each.**

Annual ryegrass	Kikuyugrass
Bermudagrass	Perennial ryegrass
Buffalograss	Red fescue
Colonial bentgrass	Rough bluegrass
Creeping bentgrass	Seashore paspalum
Dichondra	St. Augustinegrass
Hard fescue	Tall fescue
Kentucky bluegrass	Zoysiagrass

**Annual bluegrass is a weed that often invades lawns and becomes managed as a turf species. For more information on annual bluegrass, refer to: Pest Notes: Annual Bluegrass.

Acknowledgments
References

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Statewide IPM Program, Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of California
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