70 ASPARAGUS 
places for injurious insects and fungi. Some recom- 
mend leaving the seedless plants as a mulch during 
the winter, but the possible benefit of this is so insig- 
nificant that it is not worth while to leave them for a 
second cleaning in spring, when time is far more 
valuable. 
RENOVATING OLD ASPARAGUS BEDS 
The principal causes of asparagus beds running out 
are that in the first place ten plants are set outina 
space where only one could thrive; then that the ground 
is not rich enough and had no proper cultivation; and 
last, but not least, that the cutting of the stalks has 
been carried to excess. What to do with the old bed - 
is sometimes a perplexing question, especially when a 
place changes hands and the new proprietor has more 
progressive ideas than the former one had. 
Let the old bed stay, and set out a new one accord- 
ing to rational methods. Some years ago the writer 
came into possession of an asparagus bed which was 
known to be forty years old, and may have been much 
older. It was a solid mass of roots without any dis- 
tinguishable rows. ‘The spears produced were so small 
and tough that the first impulse was to dig up the 
roots. But as this proved to be a more formidable 
task than was anticipated, another plan was pursued. 
In autumn the bed was thickly covered with fine yard 
manure. The following spring the bed was marked 
out into strips of two feet in width. When the 
sprouts appeared those in every alternate strip were 
cut clean off during the entire summer, and the others 
allowed to grow. Inthe autumn of the year another 
