Having a little afternoon snack; bowl of sauted asp. in butter,salt,and pepper. Tasted like more 
We still have about 1/2 acre of snap beans, some vine crops, and of course, asparagus. Most is given away at church now. What really killed us was the wasted time marketing and the sore feet and back.Sitting in parking lots daily from 4-7 for 3.50 a lb. wasn’t effective use of time. We got it picked w/2 helpers in about 2-3 hours. Picked into plastic waste paper baskets and transferred into 18 gal. rubbermaid tubs. The #2 went to a Chinese restaurant, the selects went to several high end rest.,and the rest in bunches were sold in farm markets. We mostly grew winter squash. Some tomatoes, bell peppers, and eggplant. Mostly to Italian rest. and groceries. Des Moines has a large Italian population and some amazing chefs. We are very blessed in that manner. The Chinese rest. knocked asp. out of the park too. To old and fat for commercial veg now. Still like my fresh veggies and my apple trees.
A local farm/garden supply only had Jersey Supreme crowns in stock. Does anyone know how it compares to J.Giant and J.Knight?
Supreme had a smaller spear size. 1/2" to 3/4". Excellent fusarium crown rot tolerance. Best in light soils which we didn’t have. Supreme was introduced after we planted knight or I would of used it. Knight doesn’t hold tip tightness as well as the others. Giant really gets purple in cooler temps. What supreme we planted was the lightess colored. I’d eat a bowl of any of the three covered in butter now!
While I like the Jersey varieties, the best asparagus I grow is Millenium. It’s got the best production hands down. It is pricey, however, and a little hard to find.
Okay, thanks for the input. Millennium > Jersey Giant > Jersey Supreme > Jersey Knight
On another issue, I tried moving some crowns in spring after the thaw. I found that the crowns were very brittle and broke up when trying free them from the soil. Part of the problem is the compaction of the soil. The other issues is their turgidity. Is there a trick to recovering crowns? Crowns sold to growers seem to be flexible due to dehydration. I’m not sure how I could ever get them in that state during dormancy in my type of soil. It seems like lighter soil is the only way.
AJ,
Every time I’ve received crowns they come very sandy so they’re getting grown in a sandy soil. I’m sure that facilitates digging and soil sterilization and allows good water and fertility control. One tip for moving crowns that I used with some success: cut the crown in half vertically and move a large soil ball. You may lose a year but it works for me
I wasn’t sure if they would recover from being broken in half, so that is promising. I flagged where the spears were coming up in the previous year. The high silt-clay loam soil they were in has the consistency of sculpting clay when moderately moist. Next time I will try cutting and lifting the crowns in bigger soil ball. Then I can wash off the soil with water if need be.
Last year was my first year planting asparagus. Probably an obvious question, but should I mow over the row to get rid of all the dead stocks on top? Clean it up all neat and tidy like? Thanks
@SMC_zone6 - I do. I was told by a local farmer to allow the asparagus to fern out around June 1 when stalks are thinner than a pencil. Allow fern to grow until killed with frost, then cut and clean plant back to soil line. That method has been working great for me. I am in Central/South NJ.
We would mow in the spring to allow the ferns to catch snow for spring water. Trick was to mow after the snow melted but the ground was frozen. I think we got that done 1 out of 3 years. We found that we could mow up till the first spears emerged because the first spear is usually tough, stringy, and twisted. Pre-emergent can go down anytime before spear emegence, preferred before a rain. If you can find it, lawn fertilizer with pre-emergent works well. Pre-emergent needs to be pendimethilin(prowl) it’s labeled and you get fertilizer too. Mowing down to the ground makes your crop easier to pick, less spear damage and less finger damage, the broken off ferns are very sharp and the cuts infect very fast. Weed grass will cut your yield 80-90% and eventually crowd your patch out. You can spray roundup up to 1 week before spear emergence.
Around here it grows wild in a lot of areas. Some places it has been growing for many decades with no care at all in all kinds of conditions. Recently it has been getting to be kind of a “thing” with many people. Kind of like searching out morels each spring .
When I was growing commercially there was a lot of ditch asparagus too, I treated it with roundup. No competition.
I plan to cover my rows with a thin-ish layer of wood chips. Thanks for the tip about mowing after snow melt.
Always wanted to try mulches but 14 acres was just too much. How much do you grow?
I planted two rows, 16’ each. Purple Passion, Jersey Supreme, and Asparabest varieties.
I’ve had good luck burning last year’s asparagus fronds. I think it helps with controlling asparagus beetles.
I wonder when the first spears will show up this year? I see from my photo at the beginning of this thread it was April 15 last year but we are much earlier this spring.
spent my day yesterday doing the same thing (Burning old fronds). I feel like we will be earlier this year as well, but nothing yet!
The forecast shows lowes in the fifties here for the next ten days , that should warm the ground.
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