ASPARAGUS. 27 



lit', them to stakes during summer, taking care not to 

 drive the stake through the crown of the plant. In autumn, 

 when the berries are ripe, wash out the seeds, if for the 

 market, or to be sent to a distance ; but for home sowing, 

 keep them in the berry till the time of sowing, the pulp 

 being a great nourishment to the seed, which ought to be 

 kept in a dry place during the winter." Hort. Trans. 



The following directions for cultivating asparagus are 

 from the second volume of the Memoirs of the New York 

 Board of Agriculture. They were furnished by Richard 

 Treat, the oldest gardener at the Shaker village in New 

 Lebanon, Columbia county, New York : 



" Beds should be made as soon as the ground is clear from 

 frost the first part of April, in ordinary seasons. The 

 ground must be well worked to the depth of a spade blade, 

 and intimately mixed with rotted horse-manure. The seeds 

 should then be sowed in rows or drills, twenty inches apart 

 and one inch deep, the rows crosswise of the beds. They 

 should be raked in lengthwise of the rows. 



" Asparagus will be large enough to begin to cut the 

 third spring after it is sowed. It may be cut until the 20th 

 June every year afterwards. As soon as the cutting season 

 is over, hoe it over lightly, so as to loosen the soil, and make 

 the surface even. Every other year, spread on each bed 

 an inch layer of good yard-manure before hoeing. The 

 tops will now grow to a great size, and mostly seed well. 

 Early in the spring, cut the dry tops close to the ground, 

 lay them evenly on the beds, and burn them there. Then 

 hoe the beds over, and rake them again. They are then 

 prepared for a new growth. 



" Most of the English books recommend breaking up 

 old asparagus beds once in a certain number of years. 

 Some of the Shakers' beds have been cut twenty-five years, 

 and, under that course of treatment, are as good as they 

 ever were." 



Armstrong, in the treatise quoted above, says, " It has been 

 lately asserted, and with sufficient confidence, that a pickle 

 of salt and water, of the ordinary strength for preserving 

 meat, may b^very usefully applied to asparagus beds in the 

 spring. The effects ascribed to it are, its stimulating pow- 

 er over the crop, and its tendency to destroy the seeds of 

 weeds, and of insects lying near the surface. Experiments 



