The water leachate from a municipal solid waste (MSW) compost may contain higher contents of organic matters and nutritive elements such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium than soil leachate. The MSW compost leachate, if utilized rationally, could be a useful resource for plant growth. In this work, the leachate from a MSW compost was used to cultivate soilless sods of Lolium perenne L. and Festuca arundinacea L. Initial growth of the two turfgrasses with different percentages of the compost leachate showed that the 100%-leachate caused a slight delay in germination peak but did not reduce the germination rates of L. perenne and F. arundinacea, which reached above 94% and 92% respectively on the 11th d. For L. perenne, the 80%-leachate significantly improved the plant height, aboveground biomass, and chlorophyll content. For F. arundinacea, 60% was found to be the optimum leachate concentration. Then with the leachate at the optimum concentrations, the soilless sods of the two turfgrasses were cultivated in a simulated climate box under 16-22℃, and relative humidity 36%-57%. After a 72-d growth, the soilless sods were transplanted to a plot and cultivated for another 90 days in order to examine the feasibility of using the leachate for cultivating the sods.
On the 90th d after sodding in the field, the aboveground biomass of L. perenne and F. arundinacea reached 5.38 g/block and 7.89 g/block, respectively, which were significantly higher than those of control. But there were no significant differences in underground biomass and root length. Compared with control, the compost leachate greatly reduced root/shoot ratios of L. perenne and F. arundinacea. Besides, the sod greenness as well as the leaf texture, uniformity, density, and quality were considerably improved.