Ophiosphaerella agrostis sp nov and its relationship to other species of Ophiosphaerella

Creeping bentgrass commonly is grown on golf courses in the United States. In the fall of 1998, symptoms of a new disease were observed on bentgrass p utting greens in three states. The causal agent was determined to be an und escribed species of Ophiosphaerella based on morphological characteristics. This was supported by sequence analysis of the complete ITS region of the rDNA. A new species, Ophiosphaerella agrostis, is described based on these morphological and molecular analyses. Intraspecific genetic variation was a ssessed using amplified fragment length polymorphism DNA fingerprinting of 17 isolates collected from nine different locations. A 90% similarity was f ound among the isolates.