Planting Asparagus

I should have done this post a while back. I was just reading the "asparagus in the egg bed" posting by James at random plantings (www.randomplantings.com) and he had done a bit of research about planting asparagus. Well so have I and it is about time I shared, as I have found out some crispy information.

First off some quick basics. Asparagus is a long lived (about 20 years) perennial, so it needs to be located in the garden where it can live out its life for many years to come. While it can be readily transplanted, it will take time to recover from the move, meaning less fresh asparagus in the kitchen (if it even makes it that far). Asparagus does well in a sunny position, but it can also handle some shade during the day and still perform well.

As James stated in one of the comment responses, asparagus loves a deep rich well drained soil. Of those adjectives, well drained is the most important. Poorly draining soil can result in root rot. So don't dig a pit into clay soil, particularly in sub/tropical areas with heavy seasonal rains.

Asparagus is tough, it can grow just about anywhere. If a seed is able to germinate in a crevice between two rocks, it will and will do quite fine thank you very much. That said, you want eat the new shoots, so giving it deep rich soil will allow the plant to produce more spears more often. And more spears means more tasty dishes.

Asparagus is happiest in a neutral soil pH between 6.5 and 7.5. If the pH starts getting below 6.0, then it will start to suffer. As mentioned previously, asparagus likes rich soil, but particularly rich in phosphorus and potassium. So make sure you given them fertiliser rich in phosphorus and potassium when planting. In fact (as I have also proven), the roots can handle being directly on the fertiliser.

Asparagus should be planted about 12.7 cm to 15.3 cm deep. Any deeper will result in a decreased yield. This information is quite different to what the majority of web sites or even "experts" will tell you. Ohio State University is to thank for this tidbit.

Of course the next question is how close to plant them. Again the information in this area can vary considerably, however with good reason. You need to know how you plant to harvest your plants, how rich the soil is, and what other competition exists. In ideal conditions, they can be planted as close as 15.2 cm. That right, 15.200000 cm. This tidbit is from John F. Kelly, J. Bakker, Hugh C. Price, and Norman L. Myers. This means you can get your 20+ asparagus into a small area and get a better yield of harvest. This is much smaller area than what the Gardening Australia fact sheet on asparagus tells you (in fact much of the information there is out of date).

So what did I do when I planted my 80-some home grown seedlings out?

• I prepared the soil as well as I could (see the Asparagus Galore post).
• I used individual holes for planting out the seedlings as opposed to a furrow (purely by choice).
• I offset the rows resulting in a diamond type planting pattern. The spacing between the plants was no closer than 30 cm partly due to the state of the soil prior to improvement. As a future experiment, I will plant some new seedlings in the centre of the diamond (giving a 15 cm plant spacing) to see what the result is.
  
• The plants were planted about 10 cm deep which is even shallower than recommended. This was on purpose as I figure I can always add more compost over time.
• I added chicken manure to each of the planting holes. While I did not hold the chooks bum over the asparagus seedling hole, it was freshly collected during the days prior and even on the day.
• The roots were not spread out during planting. There is no need to do this as it makes no difference to the growth of the plant.
  

So I hope that this "fresh" information helps people out there growing asparagus. I will post another entry in the future about harvesting asparagus as I again have some interesting information to share.

Asparagus galore

I recently had some areas tilled with a tractor complements a wonderful neighbour who is also into food gardening. The first tilled section is for a large planting of asparagus. The area is approximately 12m by 2.3m so there is plenty of room for a multitude of plants.

A few months back, I was very fortunate to have been given a couple of mature asparagus plants from a couple in a local food growing group. They also provided me with heaps of seeds. So I attempted to germinate 198 of them and got about 180 viable plants. Not a bad start.

I have slowly been planting them out into the newly tilled soil. Unfortunately the soil in this area is poor. It comprises of subsoil (deco and clay) from the previous owners earthworks. I incorporated gypsum along with basalt rock dust, dead grass, and manure. So there should be hope for the asparagus producing capabilities of this rejuvenated soil. Asparagus is extremely hardy, as long as it has good drainage, so I shouldn't be disappointed. I also raised the bed about 10 cm or so above the existing ground level which will help with drainage.

For those of you who have not tasted fresh off the plant asparagus spears, it is like an entirely different vegetable. Fresh asparagus is unbelievably sweet and tasty. This is a plant worth making space for in the home garden. Come on spring!

Harvesting sweet potatoes

The time had come to dig up some sweet potatoes. We had waited well over 3 months since planting. Our first planting location was around the edge of the banana pit. This is a classic permaculture type of set up. The idea being that the sweet potatoes will help stop invasion of unwanted plants such as grass. From my experience this works well.

That said, I would not use a highly invasive sweet potato in this area again. I have three types of sweet potato growing on property. The first one is a small leaved plant which produces white tubers with a white skin. I have been very pleased with this plant as it is not very invasive; which is what you want when you have a banana pit or don't want the plant to take over.

The second sweet potato is a more of your classic looking plant with medium sized leaves. The plant produces white tubers with a purple skin. This plant almost over took my banana pit. Not to mention about the same space again to the right of the pit (where some grass was).

The third sweet potato is again a classic looking plant. The tubers produced have an orange flesh with the same coloured skin. It has similar rampid tendencies.

As the sweet potato vine had intermingled with the banana, it was a bit challenging to remove the tubers without significantly impacting the banana roots. The main part of the banana pit was compost created at the site, basically heaps of horse manure with grass and a bit of deco. This has turned into a beautiful rich soil. The raised edge around the pit comprised of clay and deco, a rather poor soil (or so I thought).

Upon harvesting the sweet potato from within the banana pit as well as along the edge of the pit (with the so called poor soil), I was extremely surprised to find that the harvest was far greater from the clay/deco mix as opposed to the rich compost. The harvest ratio was about 10 times greater for equivalent space. In the picture, the pile on the left is from a space about the same as the area which the pile takes. The pile on the right is from about 7 times the area of the first pile.

It should be noted that sweet potatoes have significantly better nutritional value than "normal" potatoes. Not only that, for the home gardener, they have the benefit of being able to store the tubers in the soil and harvest when needed. Thus they make a fantastic survival food with a significant enough planting area. Just make sure to harvest the tubers within two years, otherwise the tuber quality can significantly deteriorate.

As for a recipe suggestion, try using them in a pumpkin soup. Basically replace about half the pumpkin quantity with sweet potato. We prefer to roast the pumpkin, sweet potato, onion, and garlic for our soup. Sweet potato is also exceptional eaten baked with half a tsp of fenugreek and some olive oil. Yum! :)