428 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
There are many beautiful wild flowers here; the fields, the meadows, 
and the woods are one vast flower garden, but it is useless for me to at- 
tempt a description of all of them. I will mention only one more, and. that 
is the wake-robin, or trillium. This flower commences to blossom in May 
and continues in blossom about four weeks; first it is pure white, after a 
time the blossom turns to a light pink and then to a very dark pink, and 
these three colors continue as long as the blossoms last. We have many 
acres of this plant, and there is nothing in the spring time that so delights 
the eye as the trillium. At the present time these wild flowers are a large 
part of my perennial flower garden; but I intend to enlarge my cultivated 
garden as fast as time and circumstances will admit. It is only little more 
than two years since I came to this country, and the place where I now live 
was wild land, with neither fence, field or buildings; and the land has never 
been disturbed by the plowman, and as I have lived nearly seventy-six years, 
I am too old to bring into cultivation a very large piece of land in two years 
that is partly covered with timber. 
Now, I have told you about my perennial flower garden, but if my sub- 
ject had been annuals instead of perennials this article would have been 
more interesting. I said in the former part of this article that I had culti- 
vated flowers for many years, but they were mostly annuals that I cultivat- 
ed; although I intend to enlarge on perennials, I shall not give up the an- 
nuals;.it affords me much pleasure to work in my garden of annuals, and I 
take pride in showing them to visitors. J believe people would be more 
happy and enjoy life better if they were in the habit of cultivating more flow- 
ers to delight the eye and gladden the heart. Let us then give a little 
time and at least a small piece of ground to the cultivation of flowers. 
ASPARAGUS FOR THE MARKET GARDEN. 
W. G. BEARDSLY, MINNEAPOLIS. 
From three-fours of an acre to an acre of ground makes a good-sized 
bed of asparagus for the market garden. In setting out a bed of it, choose 
good ground, and if convenient get a south slope. Having chosen the 
ground, my plan is to set two-year-old plants four feet apart one way, and 
two feet and a half the other. Four thousand plants to the acre is a good 
stand. 
For planting mark out the ground in rows four feet apart. Turn a dead 
furrow for the plants, rake the bottom of the furrow to make a root-bed and 
lay in the plants the proper distance apart. Hoe a little dirt over them, and 
the work is almost complete. By cultivation during the summer and fall 
these furrows are filled up and the roots are covered with a good depth of 
earth. In order that the ground may not be wholly unproductive to the 
gardener during the first year, potatoes or small truck may be raised be- 
tween the rows. 
Late in the fall cover the asparagus bed thoroughly with manure. In 
the spring cultivate and drag it thoroughly. The second year from plant- 
ing you will have a very good bed for cutting for thirty days, which is 
about half of an asparagus season. In the immediate vicinity of Minneapolis 
is a bed of seven-eighths of an acre which produced for its owner early last 
summer $300 worth of asparagus. 
