After the rototilling (thanks, Bill!) and the fertilizing and the leveling the soil in the raised beds with a rake was finished, we started planting. About a quarter of one of the gardens was planted with asparagus about 3 years ago, and we both love it so much we decided to expand that garden. We planted Jersey Giant, Martha Washington, and Purple Giant varieties, which were all the ones that we could find locally.
At first glance, the asparagus crown (as it’s called) is not attractive; it looked sort of like an octopus, actually. I’m not sure I would have known what to do with it, but fortunately my husband did. After removing the rubber band that bound them, it became evident that the one big octopus was actually 8 individual octopi. We teased them apart and buried them in the raised beds about 8 inches deep then covered with 2-3 inches of soil per the package instructions. The crowns are spaced 8-12 inches apart. Water ’em in. Call it a day.
The potatoes are planted in a similar manner. These at least look like what they purport themselves to be. We planted Baby Yukon Golds. My husband said the package planting instructions usually say to quarter the potatoes before burying them but since this package did not, we didn’t.
Now we have 3/4 of one 8 x 12 raised bed planted with asparagus, and 1/4 with baby Yukon golds. The books say not to harvest asparagus until it’s been growing for something like six years. This is supposed to help the plant get better established by sending the plant’s energy back into the roots (or something like that). It’s been 3 years now for our first crop, and we’re going to be brave and cut a few spears in a day or so. We’ve decided that we’re willing to risk it, especially now that we have so many more crowns in the ground! 🙂
Karen Creamer Author, Coach, Speaker 