Asparagus?

How many asparagus do you plant per square?

Asparagus is listed in the book, 1 or 4 to the ft. supposedly will produce better yields at 4 to the ft. Remember, asparagus can remain in the ground for 20+ years, so need a permanent box.

Thanks!

I'm thinking ahead for next year's asparagus bed. I want to start asparagus but haven't been able to figure out how many crowns I will need or the spacing. Some people do 1 crown per sq ft and others do 4 per sq ft. What I really wanted was to see a square foot garden with asparagus planted. I stumbled upon this blog by accident, checkout the article about 2/3rds of the way down. There are a couple more small articles and more pictures if you click on the links. He's got 75 plants in his bed, it's 27 feet long but it shows us asparagus newbies what we want to see.

http://www.senior-gardening.com/blogs/2011/may-11.html#110514calback

Pretty cool!

I am going to do this as well...I am hoping this will be my only addition to the garden next spring. I need to read this thread and do some research on how big I need the box to be.

I am reading a book called The Animal Vegetable Miracle and I am only 35 pages in and it is changing my life...the book made me decide to put in Asparagus next year.

I think the spacing depends on what you want to get out of it.
1 per ft. will give you some to eat and room for the asparagus to expand its root system, and make more in spears in yrs. to come.
With 4 per ft. you will get more to eat sooner, with less room for the asparagus to expand.
Question to the Master SFG folks: Will the asparagus get "pot bound" in the yrs. to come in a SFG box?


I really liked the link to the Senior Gardening pages. He really works hard.
I'm so glad that SFG requires no tiller.
Jo

Interesting littlejo, I guess it depends on if you can wait to let the plants expand in years to come or if you want instant bountiful harvest. I'm also wondering if you need to divide the roots. I'm thinking in terms of iris rhizomes, or bulbs. Do you need to divide asparagus? I liked the blog too, I'll have to read it when I get time. I better bookmark it.

middlemama, isn't that a great book? I finished it a couple of weeks ago and I thoroughly loved it. Of course I love Barbara Kingsolver's other books too. It really makes you think about how our food is produced and how it gets to us (how far it's trucked). I think I may have to read the book again just because I enjoyed it so much. Here is a blog written by another woman who did a similar thing and stopped buying food from her supermarket, she only bought her paper and toiletry items from the store, the rest she bought at the farmer's market, grew it herself or bought from small shops who make things like cheese and sausages. It's very interesting and she has lots of pictures of gardens and food and stuff. http://austinurbangardens.wordpress.com/

I purchased 2 year old asparagus plants from a nursery this spring in a 1 gallon pot. I should have purchased the three the nursery sold, but only bought 1. The nurseryman said it could be divided, so I divided it into 4 and planted 1/square.

The asparagus crowns I planted last year were hit and miss this year in returning. They produced maybe 5 shoots this spring, so the bed has 7 squares for asparagus.