The Busy Woman s Garden Book 



asparagus plants which come up every year from 

 self-sown seed; to avoid this the tops should be 

 cut, as soon as the berries are red, and burned. 

 If the tops are burned on the bed the resulting 

 ashes will be of benefit. It has been my obser- 

 vation for many years that the spots where the 

 tops were burned always gave finer stalks than 

 the rest of the bed; this suggests the application 

 of wood ashes as a top dressing after the dressing 

 of manure, which should be applied every 

 spring, has been worked into the soil. A heavy 

 covering of barnyard manure may be applied in 

 the fall and spaded under in the spring, or it 

 may be applied in February; if this is not feas- 

 ible it is an excellent plan to spade into the space 

 between the hills any available manure — poultry, 

 rabbit or sheep or stable manure that is well 

 rotted. The space between the rows, or paths, 

 should not be broken up when this is done as, if 

 unbroken and hard, it is easier to keep the beds 

 clean and an application of some good herbicide 

 may even be used to keep down weeds here. 

 When the bed has been thoroughly spaded and 



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