of the most successful of its minor industries. There is a large area in
the State which is exactly suited to the production of this vegetable.
This is the region of sedimentary deposits, washed by waters that are
to some extent brackish, or naturally saline. Commercial asparagus
farming is limited to the reclaimed lands around the bay of San
Francisco, the marshy deltas of the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers,
and the so-called peat lands of Orange and San Luis Obispo counties.
Small beds, however, for local consumption are to be found in California
as generally and frequently as they are in other States.
There is a fascination about asparagus culture that is founded on
legitimate financial returns. It is practically "a sure thing" when once
established, and the conditions of climate and soil are such that the
work attendant on production is a minimum in proportion to the return.
No diseases of the plant have yet shown themselves in California, and it
is seldom that the weather is unsteady enough to be a factor in limiting
production. The deterring feature is the fact that it is not till the
third year that a return can be expected on the investment. But as other
crops, such as potatoes and beans, can be grown between the rows in the
interim, the time of waiting is not so entirely an unproductive one as
might at first be supposed.
The methods of preparing, planting, and working are practically the same
in all sections of California. The proposed beds are plowed as deeply as
possible and thoroughly fertilized. All of the soils appropriate for
commercial asparagus farming are so light that deep cultivation is a
comparatively easy matter. Furrows for planting are then run and made
double depth. Some growers think it worth while to distribute
fertilizer along these furrows and then turn for a third time, so as to
enrich the ground immediately below the roots to be set out. These
furrows are run from four to six feet apart, the latter being considered
the better usage. In them one-year-old plants are then set by hand at
distances varying from eighteen inches to three feet. The former
distance is preferred by the Italian growers on Bay Farm Island in San
Francisco Bay, but the Southern growers and those along the Sacramento
River lean to the greater distance. The only difference seems to be
whether there will be sufficient nutriment in the soil to force the
plant into giving as large and tender shoots as where each plant is
allowed a larger area. The plants are set with the crowns about four
inches below the surface and the roots are carefully spread out before
covering. Planting is done any time from November to April, but the
middle of February is perhaps the most common time.
The culture for the first year consists in keeping the soil loose and
free from weeds. Ordinarily other crops are grown between the rows, and
their cultivation serves to keep the ground in proper condition. The
asparagus is allowed to come up, feather, and seed without interference,
no cutting being done the first year. Care, however, is taken to cut off
the tops close to the ground in the fall before the seed begins to
drop--the volunteer asparagus being the worst enemy in culture with
which the grower has to deal. About the beginning of the rainy season a
heavy coating of manure is placed over the beds and left to be leeched
in by the rains.
[Illustration: FIG. 48--VIEW OF ASPARAGUS FIELD ON BOULDIN ISLAND,
CALIFORNIA]
The second year some growers cut more or less for market, but the bed
is then longer in coming to its full strength and will not give so large
a product the following years. There is a variation in the spring
working, according to the nature of the land. Where the soil has a
tendency to be cold, the first plowing is away from the rows, so as to
let the sun more quickly down to the starting plants. Where the soil is
light, or the season forward, this plowing is omitted. The latter
plowings are toward the rows, the effort being by ridging to give a long
blanched surface to the shoots. For the canneries where nothing but the
white product is put up, the shoots are cut the instant they show their
tips above the surface. The local market shows a preference for the
greener shoot, and so before cutting it is allowed to stretch itself up
into the light. The third year regular cutting begins, and from that
time forward the beds increase in the quantity and quality of the
product for the next fifteen years.
The methods of marketing are somewhat different from those practiced in
the East. Little or none of the asparagus is bunched. It is packed loose
in boxes holding from forty to fifty pounds, and the loose product is
retailed to the consumer by the pound. The first boxes begin to go out
by the beginning of February, though small quantities can be seen in
market as early as January 15th. The canning contracts run, as a rule,
from March 1st to June 15th. After that the weather is so dry that the
yield stops unless the beds are irrigated. In most sections, however,
irrigation is not necessary up to this time.
A notable exception to this is Bouldin Island, in the San Joaquin
River. This is reclaimed land, and lies some six or eight feet below the
surface of the water. The soil is river silt on a peat stratum thirty
feet deep. The top is so fine and friable that it does not, in spite of
the surrounding river, hold enough moisture to keep the vegetation alive
during the hot spring months. A north wind in May would lift up the
whole surface of the island and carry it away in dust. It is an easy
matter, however, to let in water through the dikes, and this is done in
sufficient quantities to keep the soil in place.
The question of profit in asparagus growing is one that can only be
treated in a relative way. The industry is as yet so new, and instances
of phenomenal returns from small holdings are so many, that it is hard
to arrive at what might be called a commercial ratio of gain. It is safe
to say, however, that with ordinary care there has never been an actual
loss with asparagus culture in California. A low estimate of profit is
probably $50 per acre. The cost of preparation and planting where diking
has not been necessary has seldom been more than $100 per acre. The
gross returns taken from recent years' reports vary from $100 to $200
per acre, so that it can readily be seen that the return to the
asparagus farmer is very fair. Most of the farms in California are in
rented land. The Bay Farm Island people pay a ground rent of $50 per
acre. On Bouldin Island the rental is on a basis of 40 per cent. of the
net proceeds. In Fig. 48 is presented a view of a fully established
asparagus field on Bouldin Island.
WARREN CHENEY.
_Alameda County, Cal._
ASPARAGUS IN FRANCE
Asparagus is grown much more abundantly and to a much larger size in
France than in England. The country is half covered with it in some
places near Paris; farmers grow it abundantly, cottagers grow it, and
everybody eats it. Near Paris it is chiefly grown for market in the
valley of Montmorency and at Argenteuil, and it is cultivated
extensively for market in many other places. About Argenteuil several
thousand persons are employed in the culture of asparagus.
It is grown to a large extent among the grape-vines as well as alone.
The vine under field culture is cut down to near the old stool every
year, and allowed to make a few growths which are tied erect to a stake.
One plant is put in each open spot, and given every chance of forming a
large specimen, and this it generally does. The growing of asparagus
among the vines is a very usual mode, and a vast space is thus covered
with it about here.
It is also grown in other and special ways. Perhaps the simplest and
most worthy of adoption is to grow it in shallow trenches. These are
usually about four feet apart. The soil generally is a rather stiff
sandy loam with calcareous matter in some parts, but the soil has not
all to do with the peculiar excellence of the vegetable. It is the
careful attention to the wants of the plant which produce such good
results. Here, for instance, is a young plantation planted in March; and
from the little ridges of soil between the trenches have just been dug a
crop of small early potatoes. In England the asparagus would be left to
the free action of the breeze, but the French cultivators never leave a
young plant of asparagus to the wind's mercy while they can find a stake
of oak about a yard long.
When staking these young plants they do not insert the support close to
the bottom, as we are too apt to do in other instances, but a little
distance off, so as to avoid the possibility of injuring the root; each
stake leans over its plant at an angle of forty-five degrees, and when
the shoots are big enough to touch it, or to be caught by the wind, they
are tied to the stake. The ground in which this system is pursued being
entirely devoted to asparagus, the stools are placed very much closer
together than they are among the vines--say, at a distance of about a
yard apart. The little trenches are about a foot wide and eight inches
deep.
The best asparagus in France is grown at Argenteuil and by one system
mainly. The plants--one-year seedlings (never older)--are planted in
shallow trenches seven or eight inches deep, the plants a little more
than one yard apart and the lines four feet apart. No manure is given at
planting; no trenching or any preparation of the ground, beyond digging
the shallow trench, takes place. In subsequent years a little manure is
given over the roots in autumn; the soil, thrown out of the trenches and
forming a ridge between them, is planted with a light crop in spring. In
all subsequent years the earth is placed over the crowns in spring and
removed in autumn.
Under this system good results are obtained in various soils, the only
difference being that on cold clay soils the planting is not quite so
deep. Every winter the growers notice the state of the young roots, and
any spot in which one has perished they mark with a stick, to replace
the plant the following March. Early every spring they pile up a little
heap of fine earth over each crown. When the plantation arrives at its
third year they increase the size of the mound, or, in other words, a
heap of finely pulverized earth is placed over the stool, from which
some, but not much, asparagus is cut the same year, taking care to leave
the weak plants and those which have replaced others untouched for
another year.
The process of gathering is interesting to the stranger. Asparagus
knives of various forms are described in both French and English books,
but one is confidently told by the growers that they are only fitted for
amateurs who do not care to soil their fingers. The cultivators here
never use a knife, the work being done with the hands. Gatherings are
made every second day about the end of April, but in May when the growth
is more active the stools are gathered from every day.
The French mode of cultivating asparagus differs from the English
principally in giving each plant abundant room to develop into a large
healthy specimen, in paying thoughtful attention to the plants at all
times, and in planting in trenches instead of a raised bed. They do not,
as is done in England, go to great expense in forming a mass of the
richest soil far beneath the roots, but rather give it at the surface,
and only when the roots have begun to grow strongly.--W. ROBINSON, in
"Parks and Gardens of Paris."
INDEX
PAGE
American varieties, 18
Barr's Mammoth, 18
Columbian Mammoth White, 19
Conover's Colossal, 19
Donald's Elmira, 19
Eclipse, 19
Hub, 20
Mammoth, 20
Moore's Cross-bred, 20
Palmetto, 20
Purple top or green top, 21
Asparagus culture in different localities, 145
in New England, 145
on Long Island, 150
in New Jersey, 152
in the South, 154
in California, 158
in France, 164
Asparagus species, 6
plumosus nanus, 6
medeoloides, 6
Sprengeri, 6
falcatus, 8
laricinus, 8
racemosus, 10
sarmentosus, 10
Broussoneti, 13
officinalis, 13
acutifolius, 16
aphyllus, 16
Botany, 4
Bunchers, 91
Bunching, 89
Canning, 112
Eastern methods, 112
Pacific coast methods, 118
Crates, 96
Cultivation, 61
the first year, 61
the second year, 64
the third and future years, 66
Cultural varieties, 17
Cutting, 83
Manner of, 84
Drying, 122
Edible species, 13
European varieties, 21
German Giant, 22
Argenteuil, 22
Yellow Burgundy, 22
Fall treatment, 68
Fertilizers and fertilizing, 72
Forcing, 100
in greenhouse, 101
in hotbeds and frames, 103
in field, 104
in Cornell asparagus house, 110
Fungus diseases, 137
Asparagus rust, 137
Asparagus leopard spot, 144
Growing asparagus without transplanting, 32
Harvesting and marketing, 83
Historical sketch, 1
Insects, 126
Common asparagus beetle, 126
Twelve-spotted asparagus beetle, 133
Spotted ladybird, 130
Asparagus miner, 135
Knives, 88
Male and female plants, 40
Marketing, 96
Ornamental species, 6
Planting, 49
Distance to plant, 50
Depth of, 53
Manner of, 54
Placing the roots, 59
Plants, Raising of, 30
Pot-grown asparagus plants, 36
Preparation of the ground, 45
Preserving asparagus, 112
Raising of plants, 30
Renovating old asparagus beds, 70
Rubber bands, 93
Salt as a fertilizer, 81
Seed-growing, 26
Selection of plants, 38
Soil and its preparation, 43
Sorting, 89
Sorting and bunching, 89
Sterilizing, 116
Subsoiling, 47
Transplanting, Growing asparagus without, 32
Tying material, 92
Variety tests, 22