Everything's coming up asparagus

Just a quick post this week to tell you about an unexpected and welcome success in our gardening endeavors.

Remember how last week I mentioned that we had picked up some cheap asparagus crowns at the Ocean State Job Lot and tucked them into the gaps in the asparagus beds? There were seven of them in a package that was supposed to have only six, but Brian found room to squeeze them all in, and he figured if only one or two of them actually produced asparagus, that would be a pretty good deal for four bucks. After all, with all the carefully chosen hybrid varieties we've purchased before, first online and later from the Belle Mead Co-Op, probably only two-thirds of the crowns have actually produced any asparagus, so we probably shouldn't expect to get more than one-third germination from these cheapo crowns we don't even know the name of.

But yesterday, when Brian went out to water, what did he find? Tiny little asparagus shoots poking up from not one, not two, not three, but all seven of the crowns he'd planted. They're so small you can't see them very well yet, but here's one resting against his finger.

Now, of course, since these crowns only went into the ground, we won't be able to harvest any asparagus from them this year, or even next year. As long as they all stay healthy, we can probably start gleaning from them lightly in their third year, and after that we can harvest them at will. So it will be quite a while before our new plants actually become a food source for us. 

But still, given what lackluster results we've often had from the varieties we selected especially for their vigor and good production, the fact that they're coming up at all — and especially so soon after planting — is an incredibly hopeful sign, and far more than we could have expected. If all of them survive, they could increase our asparagus yields by 50 percent — maybe even more, considering how well they're starting out compared to all our other asparagus plants.

The only downside of this serendipitous job-lot find is that we still have no idea what variety it is that's thriving so well in our garden. If I knew, I'd make sure to buy more of it the next time we need replacement plants. (We could just grab whatever's on the shelf at Ocean State Job Lot at that time, but we have no guarantee it'll be the same variety.)