University of Georgia and Pure Seed resolve seashore paspalum naming issue

The University of Georgia (UGA) recently changed the name for a variety of vegetative seashore paspalum turfgrass, now called SeaScape. When the variety was announced in January 2023, the grass had a different name: SeaBreeze.

The issue was that a seeded fescue with the variety name ‘Seabreeze’ was already in the marketplace. Developed by Pure Seed, ‘Seabreeze’ slender creeping fescue (festuca rubra trichophilia) was released to the market in 1992. In 2003, Pure Seed released its successor, a more improved and glyphosate-tolerant fine fescue called ‘Seabreeze GT.’

UGA originally named the turf, continuing the tradition of naming salt-tolerant paspalum varieties with the “Sea” prefix. Earlier releases wore monikers such as ‘SeaIsle 1’, ‘SeaIsle 2000’, ‘SeaIsle Supreme’ and SeaStar.

According to UGA, SeaScape is a vigorous vegetative seashore paspalum cultivar that produces excellent-quality turf under a range of mowing heights and is suitable for use on golf courses, athletic fields, home lawns and other recreational venues as fine turf. This variety was tested under the experimental name ‘UGP 73’ and has been under development and evaluation for 16 years.

It has been evaluated extensively both in the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP) at eight southern locations from 2016-2020, where it was a decisive winner and as part of a USDA Specialty Crops Research Grant (SCRI) to develop improved drought and salinity tolerant warm-season grasses where it was tested at six southern locations from 2011-2013. In the initial two-year SCRI drought trials, ‘UGP 73’ was the top-performing entry in overall turf quality out of 80 entries. It also underwent advanced trials in SCRI at six locations in 2016-2019.

According to the International Plant Names Index database, there are more than 1,433,000 named plant varieties. In the plant world, seeded variety names may be protected under PVP (Plant Variety Protection), while vegetatively propagated varieties are most often protected in the United States by filing a plant patent and/or a trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Typically, names used in different market segments may be similar or the same without causing confusion. Although a cool-season seeded fine fescue is not likely to be confused with a warm-season vegetatively propagated seashore paspalum, Pure Seed had protected the variety name ‘Seabreeze GT’ under PVP prior to the University of Georgia acquiring name protection under trademark. And as the two databases don’t cross-pollinate, pardon the pun, the naming conflict was missed.

The team at Pure Seed and the turfgrass breeders at UGA have a longstanding collaborative relationship, making this problem easy to solve.

“Pure Seed values its long-standing partnership with the University of Georgia and its history of successful collaboration on numerous variety developments. While we recognize the importance of distinct product names for effective marketing, we believe that open dialogue and cooperation are essential to resolving any naming conflicts,” said Crystal Rose-Fricker, president of Pure Seed and Pure-Seed Testing.

When it was brought to his attention, Paul Raymer, Ph.D., who developed the new paspalum grass at UGA, immediately agreed to change the name. University staff weighed many combinations of words with the “Sea” prefix, searched all the databases for possible conflicts, and settled on SeaScape as the new name for the University’s fifth seashore paspalum release.

“SeaScape was an excellent alternative name for our new grass variety,” said Dr. Raymer. “It contains the word ‘Sea’ and by adding ‘Scape’ as the suffix, it makes you think of the word ‘landscape.’ As SeaScape is ideal for use on golf courses, athletic fields, home lawns, and other recreational venues, it was a perfect solution, and everything turned out just fine.”

Logistically, changing the name to SeaScape meant the logo and text had to be changed on all marketing materials and on the gapaspalum.com website.

Some of the characteristics of SeaScape, according to the University of Georgia, include:

• Exceptional vigor
• Improved drought tolerance
• Incredible color
• Great turf quality and density
• Superior shade tolerance
• Medium to fine leaf texture
• Good resistance to dollar spot disease, (Clarireedia sp.)
• High-quality sod with good tensile strength

SeaScape has significant advantages over other commercial seashore paspalum cultivars, according to UGA:

• Produces excellent turf quality over a wide range of mowing heights and can be used course-wide (wall-to-wall) on golf courses. It has often outperformed Salam, SeaIsle 1, SeaStar, Platinum TE and SeaDwarf.
• Has excellent turf color, often better than Salam, SeaIsle 1, SeaStar, Platinum TE and SeaDwarf.
• Has demonstrated superior drought tolerance to SeaStar over a wide range of irrigation regimes.
• The salt tolerance of SeaScape is similar to that of SeaIsle 2000 and Platinum TE and better than that of SeaIsle 1.
• SeaScape has demonstrated better tolerance to 60 percent shade than Platinum TE and SeaStar.

‘UGP 73’ will be marketed as SeaScape seashore paspalum under non-exclusive licenses. It has been licensed domestically to Creekside Growers of Arcadia, Fla., and to Sun Turf of Ft. Pierce, Fla., and internationally to Semillas Fito’ in Spain, who plan to market SeaScape throughout southern Europe and northern Africa.

SeaScape, produced in the Southeastern United States, is currently available for sale now, and European production is expected to be ready for sale in 2025.

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