I thought I’d take a walk out in the yard and take pictures of the new baby Asparagus seedlings that are coming up volunteer everywhere, but it turned into a much bigger project…first about the baby asparagus.
The birds love the red asparagus berries that ripen in late summer and fall. They carry them around the yard and eat the berries and then let them drop wherever they are eating. One of their favorite places to eat is sitting on the yard fence. This area is always wet as we are watering the lawn constantly. I was shocked to see hundreds of little asparagus plants that came up under the fence as well as in my flower boxes on the porch. It was as if I had dropped a package of asparagus seed in the area.
I dug about 30 or so of them up last night and sent them home with my son and his wife for their garden. The plants were healthy with strong roots as you can see in the next photo. Just for fun I transplanted some into pony packs to see what they will do.
Next, I headed for the garden to photograph the asparagus so that you can see the different stages of growth in the asparagus plants. Our asparagus grows rather wildly, some of it volunteer like above and I just let it stay planted where it comes up. We start picking the asparagus in late spring about the last week of April in our zone 5 and quit picking right after Fathers Day, the middle of June to allow time for it to put strength back in the crowns (the root). Toward the end of the season when we miss pickings we just let those plants go to seed.
It has been a week since Fathers Day but most of our plants are well on their way with frond growth as you will see from the photos. The fronds are in full bloom and the bees are loving it with large yellow pollen packs on their legs.
Some of the earlier plants that we let go have already passed bloom and have seeds on the plants. The asparagus needs to form lots of growth and have a full bushy look. We fertilize it in the spring using Nutri-Rich which is from chickens and has added Calcium. Also, we keep the plants watered as they grow. All of this care feeds the crowns so that we will have a great asparagus crop next year.
We have enjoyed this years crop and have eaten it several times a week, and every time company came. We took it to Sunday potblessing almost every week and filled the freezer with at least 47 quarts for the winter. Yum, yum it has been a great Asparagus year.
