The World Cup nears a climax with a semifinal match tomorrow between host country Brazil, and Germany. Millions of viewers will see grass from Oregon seed beneath the soccer players' feet.
The world's largest grass seed company - DLF Pickseed - says that Oregon growers are largely to thank for supplying the World Cup fields with 300,000 pounds of seed.
Pickseed growers in Manitoba, Canada, also claim some of the seed used in Brazil came from there.
Richard Meyers is Pickseed vice president of professional turf and retail out of Halsey, Oregon.
He says, "the majority of the seed would've been here from Oregon for sure. And if there was something that was from up there, it probably would've been something along the lines of one of the rye grasses that we had to produce up in Canada, that was based out of the United States as far as where we produced the varieties and everything."
Meyers says the North American rye grass augments a base of Bermuda grass, to protect against cooler temperatures.
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