Anthracnose Disease of Carpetgrass ( Axonopus compressus ) Caused by Colletotrichum hainanense sp. nov

Carpetgrass ( ) is a creeping, stoloniferous, perennial warm-season grass that is adapted to humid tropical and subtropical climates. Recently, outbreaks of anthracnose disease of caused by an unidentified sp. were observed in the Hainan and Guangdong provinces in southern China. In late winter and early spring, the disease incidence reached 100% in some badly infected lawns. Under high-moisture conditions, the crowns and oldest leaf sheaths of the majority of the plants became necrotic, which led to whole lawns turning reddish brown. Pathogenicity was confirmed by inoculating uninfected plants with a conidial suspension of the sp. isolated from diseased plants. Phylogenetic analyses of the combined internal transcribed spacer, , , and sequences revealed the pathogen to be a novel species of the species complex. Microscopic examination showed that the species was also morphologically distinct from related species. As a result of the phylogenetic, morphological, and pathogenicity analyses, we propose the name for this pathogen of in southern China.