Tifton 85 Bermudagrass—Early History of its Creation, Selection, and Evaluation

From 1953 to 1983, USDA entomologists and I tried to use 10‐d weight gains of fall armyworms, Spodoptera frugiperda (J.E. Smith), to measure the quality of bermudagrass, Cynodon dactylon (L.) Pers., forage. Tifton 68, Coastal, and Tifton 292 bermudagrasses fed to armyworms enabled them to make 10‐d gains of 147, 50, and 8 mg. In 1984, we space planted 145 Tifton 68 × Tift 292 F1 s in deep sand and in the fall selected 13 of the largest plants showing the least drought injury. Of these, entry 13 (‘Tifton 85’) outyielded other entries in a 3‐yr‐32‐entry small plot test. In duplicate 0.81‐ha pastures, Tifton 85 produced 47% more steer gains than ‘Tifton 78’.