Why YOU should grow Asparagus from SEED!!

hey guys welcome back once again here to the hillside and today i'm going to show you guys how to grow asparagus from seed and also talk to you about whether or not maybe it's right or not right for you in your garden so go ahead and follow this video learn how to grow some asparagus and soon you'll be harvesting your own delicious spears just like this growing at home in your own backyard it's all right let's do this okay so number one when you buy asparagus from the stores you're buying asparagus crowns okay these are usually one year old uh root stocks that are predominantly going to be almost 99 male because the male asparagus plant as are male and female asparagus plants but we'll get into that here in a second the males will produce more spears okay they're growing more vegetative vegetative foliage and everything whereas the female plants are going to worry about producing flowering stocks and producing seeds so therefore commercial growers don't want to have female plants in their fields to maximize their production but if you grow asparagus from seed you will inevitably get some female plants okay now that being said once the asparagus does have a female plant you're gonna get these guys right here okay these are asparagus berries which are toxic do not eat them and inside of these each of these you're gonna get several these little black seeds okay now the reason why i have it inside this bag i'm not really touching it is this sap in this is very very sticky so you can kind of wash this off let it soak in some water to get some of this uh pulp off of this and again it is toxic so i recommend wearing gloves some plastic gloves would be perfect for that that project alright so it's really it's a no-brainer okay so you just take the seeds out make a quarter of an inch ins you know hole in the potting soil or your growing medium drop them in now have some patience as it can take three to four weeks depending on your growing conditions uh the temperature the moisture level etc for asparagus to even sprout so be patient if you're starting these indoors start them 10 to 12 weeks as opposed to maybe six weeks like you would tomatoes or peppers to give them the biggest head start that you possibly can or you might want to experiment and plant some of these berries as they naturally would have planted themselves in the fall plant them in your garden in a little designated spot and see if they'll overwinter and sprout on their own whenever mother nature tells them to start all right guys so what are some of the pros and cons of growing your asparagus from seed at home like i just mentioned the possibility of getting a female plant okay that may be a drawback if you're a commercial grower like i said however for the home gardener it's not always a bad thing to have at least one female plant that you let stay in the garden okay so a lot of times people grow the females they'll remove them and just keep replacing them with more of the male asparagus plants for maximum production but if you want to collect your own seeds you're gonna need at least one female plant okay now that being said they will produce tons of tons of seed like i showed you in the uh the asparagus berries here some of these pods have two three four even five seeds at some times so you see how quickly you can just amass a large amount of seeds for your asparagus okay so just like these guys right here now this is the mary washington variety the one i showed in the opening uh those those were grown from seed now i just planted all these seeds here and of course some did not come up which is fine some were eaten by slugs that's fine but this is i think a 72 cell tray and i have tons of seeds left over so you're thinking one or two and i didn't even pick all the berries that was just enough to fill this little bag up right in this little bag i showed you these seeds it took me five minutes to fill this up there's probably another 150 or 200 seeds and just in this so if you want to massively expand your asparagus growing quickly and for basically for free once the plants already grown right yeah i mean you can just absolutely expand your asparagus exponentially from seed for cheap as opposed to buying maybe expensive hybrid crowns things like that okay so number two variety okay now this is a french heirloom asparagus you're never going to find crowns for this at the big box store or online maybe if you do you're going to pay up for it okay now these seeds are from baker creek seeds highly recommend this company they're awesome high quality seeds but like i said there's probably 100 plus seeds in here and it's just for a few dollars you can grow hundreds of asparagus plants okay now asparagus it can grow for 20 30 years producing more and more and more okay and as the crowns expand you can divide those up so you don't have to grow them from seed again you can just do clones you know divide the the crowns up and asparagus is just one of those amazing crops that once you get it established in your garden you're good for basically for life okay and possibly for whoever takes the property or takes over your garden after you're gone right the the asparagus and tell you it's it's basically grows like a weed as long as you keep it watered and lots of uh or nice organic material you're gonna have you're gonna have tons and tons of asparagus so why not try to grow some from seed you know the only other drawback is when you buy asparagus crowns they're typically one year old okay so asparagus you don't even want to harvest for the first three years maybe in the third year you can take a sprig you know stock here and there just as the plant is establishing itself because you don't want to rob all the energy as it's you know expanding and you know setting down all those roots and all the energy okay so growing from seed does set you back one more year which in a commercial sense understand time is money right but for the home gardener if you do this and you save seeds this year and the next year you save seeds and the next year you save seeds yes there's a long wait and a little bit of a lag time before you can start harvesting your asparagus however once it starts going if you have a succession of you know three different four different years worth of asparagus once they're all up in full production you're gonna literally have so much asparagus you won't know what to do with because this stuff is just amazing all right guys so the last tip i'm going to give you was like the last piece of advice we'll call it that okay you want to take something like this little tiny asparagus seedling right here and after three years you're going to be able to harvest these delicious spears on your own now just like tomatoes all right we all know homegrown tomatoes are you know far and away better than anything you can buy at the grocery store right everybody knows that heirloom homegrown tomatoes incomparable now the same can be said for asparagus and a nice crisp cool spring early morning when you get out there in the garden you pick a nice asparagus from your plant you can pop in your mouth eat it right away there is a sweetness that you cannot describe okay the bland green tasting asparagus you buy you know in the rubber band packages at the supermarket there do not hold a candle to these guys you know it knows now most of the asparagus you get at the stores you've got to find it you know you're going to try to snap it way up the stem a lot of it's going to go to waste this this asparagus is tender to the very end i mean this you don't get spears this long at the store that are this tender and just this delicious okay so i recommend wholeheartedly growing your own asparagus from seed yes it does take a while to see the benefits and the rewards of all your hard work however once that benefits start rolling in it just pays dividends it compounds over time it's an investment in your garden in your homestead if you want to grow in a commercial sense home grown fresh picked asparagus is a very high dollar crop okay and once you plant it you don't have to water it very often if ever i add some compost in the spring and i don't touch it it just grows and it gets bigger and more and more every single year and all you do is in the spring you get to harvest your own spears okay it's that simple okay so get out there and grow yourself some homegrown asparagus give it a shot like i said you're going to have to be blown away by the taste it is better than anything you can ever buy in the store all right guys so here from the hillside i'm going to get back to watering my plants and having some fun here in the garden you guys get out there grow some asparagus or some seed you will not be disappointed all right guys happy growing i'll see you next time here on the hillside bye

Channel: Dave The Hillside Gardener

Views: 44,691

Keywords: asparagus, asparagus from seed, how to grow asparagus, asparagus berry, organic asparagus, Baker creek seeds, grow asparagus at home, hillside, perennial vegetables, compost, growing seeds, zone 6, zone 7, can you grow asparagus from seed

Id: veyk6O_JcTI

Length: 8min 19sec (499 seconds)

Published: Sun May 15 2022