Asparagus rows and Potatoes

I was at the nursery last night and saw the asparagus crowns in the refrigerators.  Who doesn’t need more asparagus? Of course I brought home a box. They’re Jersey Giant, male plants.  (The female plants send up skinny, woody stalks).

To plant asparagus, you dig a trench about ten inches deep.  Our soil doesn’t need much amendment for growing asparagus – it’s nice and rich.  I dug a trench near our other row, trying not to disturb the established asparagus.  Then, I placed the crowns in like this:

The crowns are about 18″ apart.  Then, I spread out the roots, carefully, and covered with about 2″ of soil.  As the shoots begin to poke through, you add additional soil, on so on, until the trench is full.

The first year we’ll mulch in the fall, maybe with straw.

It’s a three year project – this asparagus will be ready to eat in three year’s time.  Having some already takes the sting out of having to wait.  I hope to be able to pickle and/or can what we don’t eat. 

I haven’t been great about adding additional soil/compost/manure to the established row, but this year I have some ready and waiting to go on once the aspargus is finished this spring.

Potatoes were the other project this morning! I’ve never planted potatoes before, though I’ve seen it done.  I thought the kids might enjoy digging them up, and as our last frost date is May 15, today is the day to plant.  I got a hardy northern variety, Norkota, which is supposed to be easy to grow.  Seed potatoes are the best thing to try to get the very best results, and they are inexpensive.  I’d like to try some more exotic varieties, but I’ll start with a white eating potato.  If the outcome is disastrous, I won’t feel so bad.

Here’s what they look like:

And then you cut in half, or even quarters, leaving eyes in each piece to develop into the plant.  The cut side is planted downward.

The potatoes go into a prepared bed.  You could plant with a trench method, or a mound method.  I chose to plant in a mound because I don’t need rows, and I could make use of one entire garden bed.  I made a mound in the rectangle – it sort of looked like a fresh grave!

This area actually gets full sun – it’s shaded now because I got up very early.  Then, the potatoes go in, about 3-4 inches deep.  These are about 12″ apart.  Ideally they would be 15″.  We’ll see if they’re too crowded or not.

These are covered – after they are up, and about 8″ of stem showing, more soil is mounded on top – the potato will form tubers off the stem.  The actual potato piece also needs to remain covered – otherwise it could turn green and become toxic. 

I just read about an interesting method of growing potatoes without a garden space, vertically.  You use 4 tires; lightly cultivate underneath, then set potatoes in the first tire; cover with soil.  As the plant grows up, cover the stem again, up to the top of the first tire, and place another tire so that the plant is forced upwards to reach the sun.  You repeat this step with each added tire, and the tubers are formed vertically along the plant stem within the stack of tires.  The tires make the stack “hot” and fast growing.  Very ingenious! Of course tires aren’t so pretty in your yard – so you’d have to pick the right spot.