THE RAISING OF PLANTS 33 
and stir the ground so as to destroy the embryo weeds, 
breaking the soil in the rows between the plants with 
the fingers or hand weeder for the same purpose. 
This must be repeated at intervals of two or three 
weeks during the summer, as the success of this plan 
is entirely dependent on keeping down the weeds, 
which, if allowed to grow, would soon smother the 
asparagus plants, that, for the first season of their 
growth, are weaker than most weeds. Intwo or three 
months after starting, the asparagus will have at- 
tained ten or twelve inches in hight, and it must now 
be thinned out, so that the plants stand nine inches 
apart in the rows. By fall they will be from two to 
three feet in hight and, if the directions for culture 
have been faithfully followed, strong and vigorous. 
‘*When the stems die down (but not before) cut 
them off close to the ground, and cover the lines for 
five or six inches on each side with two or three inches 
of rough manure. ‘The following spring renew culti- 
vation, and keep down the weeds the second year ex- 
actly as was done during the first, and so on to the 
spring of the fourth year, when acrop will be produced 
that will well reward all the labor that has been 
expended. Sometimes, if the land is particularly suit- 
able, a marketable crop may be secured the third year, 
but as a rule it will be better to wait until the fourth 
year before cutting much, as this would weaken the 
plants. ‘To compensate for the loss of a year’s time 
in thus growing asparagus from seed, cabbage, lettuce, 
onions, beets, spinach or similar crops that will be 
marketable before the asparagus has grown high 
enough to interfere with them, may be planted be- 
