This is the earliest vegetable to be ready for use in the spring,
excepting those that have been forwarded under glass. While it is quite
hardy and withstands much ill treatment, nothing will better repay
careful culture and generous feeding. One row across the kitchen garden
would make a liberal supply for an average family. The seed should be
sown where the row is to stand, and the young plants thinned out until
they stand one foot apart in the row. This should be done as soon as
they are three or four inches high and well started; if left longer it
will be a very troublesome job. These young plants should have every
encouragement of manure and cultivation, to make as strong a growth as
possible; the stronger and faster they grow the better will be the size
and quality of the shoots when old enough to cut. No shoots should be
cut until the third spring after sowing, and then should not be cut too
long the first season. The fourth and succeeding seasons it may be cut
from the time the first shoots appear until the first peas and lettuce
are ready to take its place on the table. Then it should be well worked
and allowed to attain its full growth, that strength may be stored
in the crowns to furnish the shoots for the next season’s cutting.
As soon as the tops begin to yellow, and the berries to ripen in the
fall, it should be mowed off close to the ground and the tops burnt,
taking care that all the seeds are consumed; if left on the plants
all winter the seed becomes scattered, and, owing to its capacity for
sending up shoots, it is a very difficult weed to exterminate. If
you do not wish the labor of sowing the seed and tending the young
plants, a year can be gained by purchasing the plants. The one-year
old plants are preferable unless the older ones have been transplanted
each year, as they are gross feeders, and become stunted if allowed to
crowd each other while young. To produce the large, fat shoots, it is
necessary that the seed shall have been saved from the strongest shoots
obtainable, and the plants fed constantly. The best way is to cover the
crowns, after the ground is frozen in the fall, with as much manure as
can be spared, and work it down to the roots in the spring as soon as
it can be forked in; or, if there are several rows, the manure could
be placed on them thickly and the soil ridged over it for the winter
by throwing up a couple of shallow furrows with the plow; this to be
worked down with a sharp harrow in the spring. As soon as it is dry
enough in the spring, the soil and manure of the bed should be lightly
forked over with a manure fork and the surface raked fine; the reason
for using the stable fork is that the tines are slightly curved, and
if the handle is held in a nearly horizontal position the bed can be
dug down to the roots, and the fork will slide right over the tops of
the crowns without injuring them. Where more than one row is desired
they should be planted about three feet apart, to admit of cultivation
and free access to the beds for cutting. An advantage in sowing the
seed is that the crowns are naturally established at a proper depth. In
planting the crowns obtained from the nursery-man they should be set
at a depth of three or four inches at the most; not one foot under the
surface, as is the common practice of truckers. Market gardeners cut
the shoots as soon as the tips appear above the surface, so that their
shoots are blanched for their whole length; but they do this at the
expense of the table quality, as only the tips are edible in this way,
and even these taste very much like old hay to any one who has been
accustomed to the richness and delicate flavor of shoots cut at the
surface when they are from three to four inches in height; this method
has also the advantage of not destroying the young shoots just coming
up, as the stalks are only cut an inch or so underground, and the knife
only reaches the one intended to be cut. If the appearance of the
blanched asparagus is desired, it can be much better obtained (that is,
with less sacrifice of quality) by placing four or five inches of hay,
straw or other litter over the crowns, which can be pushed away from
the stalk when cutting and easily replaced. There is another strong
reason for not following the deep planting, as usually practiced, and
that is, in having your crowns so much nearer the surface they feel the
warming and growing influence of the sun sooner in the season, and you
are able to have your asparagus for cutting a full week earlier than
your neighbor who plants deep.