Asparagus advice

In my youth, I thought asparagus was revolting; it was soft and slimy, and I couldn’t understand why anyone would willingly eat it. Then I left home and discovered that (surprise!) asparagus could be bought as a fresh vegetable with nary a tin in sight. It still took a few years before I garnered the courage to try it again – this time grilled and drizzled with olive oil and lemon juice – and that was that. Asparagus immediately became my NBVF (new best vegie friend).

Perhaps because I revered it so much, I always thought it would be difficult to grow, but I now know that, after the initial prep, it’s super low maintenance. How I weep when I think of all those wasted years not growing it. And I even had fun deciding on a ‘forever bed’, then prepping the soil – two key steps that ensure this perennial plant’s longevity in any garden.

I have grown asparagus from both seed and crowns (root divisions). Seed germinates readily in early spring, and seedlings should be transplanted outside when the risk of frost is over. You’ll wait two years before your first harvest, but growing from seed is cheaper and you’ll end up with lots of plants to give away.

Asparagus is dioecious (plants bear either male or female flowers) and spears on female plants are usually slimmer than those on male plants, which is why some people choose to remove them. I’ve left my female plants because I have room, they’re still perfectly edible, they develop pretty, red berries, and I could choose to save the seed. If space is an issue, remove the females, or at least the berries, to prevent self-seeding and overcrowding.

Bare-rooted crowns are planted in late winter. Hold off on harvesting for one year, allowing them to develop their tall fern-like stems, which creates a strong root system. After that, all bets are off, and your harvest increases yearly. My 12 four-year-old plants yielded about 3.5kg of asparagus this year, so I had the ‘luxury’ of making soup.

Harvesting season is relatively short: just 2–3 weeks in the first harvestable year, and about 10 weeks when they’ve settled in. Spears grow quickly, and you harvest every 2–3 days. I leave the thin stems (pencil-thickness diameter or less) to ‘run to fern’, as they’re usually woody. Although it might seem like a ‘wasted’ bed because asparagus doesn’t like competition, I’ve learnt that I can plant leafy greens in late winter before the asparagus wakes up and notices.

I’ve always loved vegies that give you a lot of edible bang for your buck(et) of hard work. Plant one onion, and you get… one onion. Plant tomato or zucchini, and you get a season’s harvest. But plant one asparagus crown perfectly, and you will be rewarded with 20–30 years of deliciousness.

Learn more about asparagus, here.

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