Update on our Asparagus Crown Planting: Part III

Our Final Asparagus Crown Planting Update 

May 2015

Here’s the last update ‘til fall for our newly planted asparagus crown bed. At the end of the last post, we mentioned that as the spears grow, you will gradually fill in your furrow with soil until its top surface is even with the surrounding soil line. We have been doing this since our last post, adding the final layer of soil to finish filling in the furrow today.

Surrounding Soil
Filling the Furrow

The process is the same as before: Gently pull soil into the furrow, while not completely covering any buds that are still emerging. Yesterday a large afternoon thunderstorm had already started to fill the furrow with surrounding soil. We used a collinear hoe to once more level out the rest of it. You might notice in the photos that some of the crowns are establishing faster than others and those spears have already grown well above the soil line. This is okay – some are just slower to snap out of their stay in cold storage than others and will catch up eventually.

Leveling Out the Furrow

Now that the soil level is where it should be, the next step is to cover the bed with mulch to suppress any weeds that might begin to grow. Keeping your asparagus bed free of weeds will not only save you a lot of labor, but support nutrient and moisture availability to the crowns. We use straw to mulch our bed, but other materials that allow water to percolate through, such as composted leaves, can also be used. Leave a couple inches of soil surface open around the line of spears down the center, of the bed, or keep the mulch layer thin in this area, especially if there are any crowns with spears that have not yet emerged above the soil line.

See photos below:

Your asparagus bed is now well set until fall — but keep an eye on it, and keep the soil moderately moist throughout the hot summer months.

In the fall, when the fronds have died back, cut them off at soil level, and be sure to remove all the debris, to eliminate potential habitat for asparagus beetles. Fall is also the time to add more compost, if needed, and to freshen up the mulch for the winter ahead.

Photos: Frozen food section

Jack Frost visited Johnny's Research Farm last week. His icy breath brings out the flavor in many cold-weather vegetables. The flavors of Kale, Carrots, and Spinach, to name a few, are often enhanced by a little nip of frost. And these frosty photos are pretty cool too, especially if you view them in full-screen mode.

See Flickr slideshow below.

Photos from Johnny's Fall Crop Walk and Field Trials

Here are a few photos from Johnny's Fall Crop Walk. We hosted our third and final crop walk of the 2010 growing season on October 20. We had 12 guests join us to take a look at several of our trials, including pumpkins, leeks, onions, root crops, spinach, Quick Hoops™ low tunnels, and gourds.



We hold crop walks 2 or 3 times per year at our Research Farm in Albion, Maine. Crop walks give guests the opportunity to tour our extensive trial fields, connect with other farmers and gardeners, and converse with Johnny's research staff. Check out our calendar for more Johnny's events and seasonal tips.

Visit Johnny's Trial Fields tomorrow evening: Twilight Walk October 20th, 3:00 to 5:30 p.m.

Please join us at Johnny's Research Farm in Albion for the opportunity to tour our extensive trial fields, connect with other farmers and gardeners, and converse with Johnny's research staff. We'll be discussing:

• New Quick Hoops™ Trial
• Root Crops, including Kohlrabi, Radish, Turnips, Fennel, Celeriac, Parsley, Parsnips, Chicory Root, Carrots, Scorzonera, Salsify, Burdock
• Fall Ornamentals
• Onions
• Winter Squash
• Regular and Sweet Potatoes
• Leeks

Please contact Peggy Huff at phuff@johnnyseeds.com with any questions.

The Research Farm is located at 184 Foss Hill Road in Albion. Click here for directions to Johnny's Research Farm.

Video, photos from Wednesday's Twilight crop walk

On Wednesday evening, we held the second of three scheduled public twilight crop walks at Johnny's Research Farm in Albion, Maine.

Crop walks are a lot of fun for both us and customers. We had about 20 guests on Wednesday. There was food (local bread, cheese, cookies, and melons from our trials. We had a T-shirt and hat raffle. And, of course, we had some exhibitions: We demonstrated a cool, new, labor-saving tool -- the paper-pot transplanter. We held a grafted greenhouse tomato tasting. We also looked at kale, pepper, melon, and flower trials.

If you weren't able to attend, here are a few highlights:

Johnny's product technician Steve talks peppers with a couple of guests.

A beautiful late summer bouquet.

Tasting grafted greenhouse tomatoes.

Steve discusses Johnny's pepper trials.

The next crop walk is slated for October 20 from 3 to 5:30 p.m. The focus will be on storage crops and season extension methods. If you can't make it to the public crop walks, the farm is also open for self-guided tours.

Melonhead

This morning's breakfast was on Johnny's.

Free produce is one of the fringe benefits of working here. During harvests at Johnny's Research Farm, we are often notified by the farm crew when things are "up for grabs". I scored this Snow Leopard Honeydew melon during our Wednesday morning cropwalk, a weekly event for Johnny's employees to learn about the progress of our many product trials. It's educational, helps us pass on first-hand knowledge to customers, and is often the highlight of our workweek. Steve, our melons expert, tossed me the Snow Leopard at the end of his 10-minute talk on melons. I finally cut into it Friday morning. Delicious!

Snow Leopard was a new variety for us last year. It has beautiful pale yellow skin contrasted by green splotches that look almost painted on. Some fruit finish growing with full-on vertical stripes. They grow to an average of 2 lb. The taste is incredibly sweet. A squirt of lime juice really makes this one dance on your taste buds. We sampled an earlier honeydew -- Honey Pearl -- last week. Also fantastic.

While we're talking melons, I thought I'd share a few shots of my own melon patch. My garden is located in Hallowell, Maine -- about 25 miles south of Johnny's Research Farm in Albion. This season, I'm growing 2 Johnny's watermelon varieties -- New Orchid and Sunshine.

New Orchid, an orange-fleshed watermelon, is doing pretty well. The Sunshine, not so much. I'm also growing cantaloupe. Some of the vines in these photos are from the cantaloupe which is intermingling with the watermelons. It doesn't take long for a melon patch to get out of control. As long as this situation doesn't affect the taste of my New Orchid -- the best tasting watermelon I've ever had -- I'll be happy.

New Orchid hanging on a home-made wire trellis. It's about 2 lb. now, but they can grow up to 7-9 lb.

Close-up of New Orchid's beautiful skin. Can't wait to taste what's inside!

I started both varieties inside in mid-April. I planted the seedlings at the beginning of June and covered the soil with black plastic mulch. It's been a good melon growing season here in Maine. Melons love the heat, and we've had plenty this summer. Steve, our melons expert, says we're a week or two ahead of where we'd normally be this time of year.

Grow baby, grow! That's my beloved New Orchid.

My melons are definitely a little smaller than I'd like. Although I have good southern exposure, my gardens don't get as much early morning and late afternoon sun as the crops might like because I have big trees on the east and west sides of my property. Time to break out the chainsaw?

Melon patch. The black plastic mulch heats up the soil; stops weeds; locks in moisture and nutrients; conserves water; and helps lead to a better crop.

I stuck a leftover Sunshine seedling in an empty patch of soil where an early Kale crop was. Clearly, it's not as happy as the melons grown on black plastic mulch.

Thanks for reading,
Ben

Crop walk video: Sunflower and Aster trials

This week's morning crop walk focuses on a couple of our flower trials -- Sunflowers and Asters.



See Johnny's Sunflower and Aster selections.

Afternoon crop walk, August 6, 2010

In this week's episode, we take a look at our flower trials -- Rudbeckia (Black-Eyed Susan), Amaranthus, and Sunflowers. Also on the walk, we examine a few vegetables and herbs -- Cauliflower, Kale, Cabbage, Corn, Peppers and Dill.

Visit Johnny's Trial Fields: Twilight Walk August 18th, 5:00 to 7:30 p.m.

Please join us at Johnny's Research Farm in Albion for the opportunity to tour our extensive trial fields, connect with other farmers and gardeners, and converse with Johnny's research staff. We'll be discussing:

Fruiting crops: Varieties and growing tips

Mulch trials: Review the results with the Research team

Flowers: Potential new varieties and fall planting flowers

Caterpillar tunnels: See the newest season extension tool in action, learn about its advantages

Twilight walks are part of Johnny's commitment to provide products and information to help Growers succeed. This August 18th event is the second in a three-part series. The third walk will be held October 20th. Subjects to be covered include:

• New Quick Hoops Trial
• Root Crops, including Kohlrabi, Radish, Turnips, Fennel, Celeriac, Parsley, Root
  Parsnips, Chicory Root, Carrots, Scorzonera, Salsify, Burdock
• Fall Ornamentals
• Onions
• Winter Squash
• Regular and Sweet Potatoes
• Leeks

Please contact Susan Anderson at sanderson@johnnyseeds.com with any questions.

The Research Farm is located at 184 Foss Hill Road in Albion. Click here for directions to Johnny's Research Farm.

Photos: Johnny's Variety Trials Twilight Crop Walk

Some photos from our June 30 crop walk at the Johnny's Research Farm in Albion, Maine.

The No. 14 back field is our largest. No. 14 features an assortment of lettuce, greens, peas, and summer squash.

Lettuce trials: Johnny's Farm workers did a great job making it beautiful.

Cover crop on left with four clean rows ready to plant.

Another view of the lettuce, greens and chicory trials.

Guests have a closer look at the lettuce trials.

Pumpkins under Agribon row cover. The cover has been removed and now workers are mulching the pumpkin field with straw. Video upcoming.

Guests walk to main fields after returning from back field. That's a pepper trial under the hoophouse in the background.

Tools and Supplies Product Manager Adam shows off a caterpillar hoophouse under which we're trialing eggplants and other crops.

Twilight crop walk next week at Johnny's Research Farm

Please join us next Wednesday (June 30th) from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at Johnny's Research Farm in Albion, Maine for the opportunity to tour our extensive trial fields, connect with other farmers and gardeners, and converse with Johnny's research staff.

We'll be discussing and showcasing onions from our Quick Hoops™ trial, hoop house plantings, herbs, early lettuce and greens trials, mulch trials, and caterpillar tunnel trials. Light refreshments will be served.

Please contact Susan Anderson at sanderson@johnnyseeds.com with any questions.

The Research Farm is located at 184 Foss Hill Road in Albion. Click HERE for directions.

Photos from the Quick Hoops trial

Quick Hoops Trial

Peas! Here’s a crop that you wouldn’t think you could grow in this system, but here they are. They were direct-seeded and the seeds remained dormant until spring.

Yum: This lettuce is ready to eat.

A couple things to note: Very little browning of the dormant leaves, like we saw with the Arugula; and most importantly, almost all of the varieties did well! Pretty cool.

Voila! Fresh greens in April thanks to Quick Hoops.

An artichoke peeks up through the ground after overwintering successfully under straw and a low tunnel.

Plenty of Arugula and plenty of weeds that need to be dealt with.

From L to R: Flashy Trout Back, Encore Lettuce Mix, and Spectrum Greens Mix. All direct-seeded in November. An example of a crop that was seeded after it was too cold to germinate and the seeds remained dormant until spring.

Flashy Trout Back lettuce: It's one of our prettiest lettuces. Described in our catalog as festive confetti in a salad bowl.

We held our first ‘Crop Walk’ of the year. Crop Walk is a weekly gathering of Johnny's Selected Seeds customer service reps, marketing, purchasing, operations people, and anyone else in the company who has an interest at our trial farm in Albion.

It is a time for Product Management to show off the trials and new products they are working on and also to educate on field prep techniques and pest and disease controls. This week, we featured our Quick Hoops Trial, which was a collaborative effort among product management.

Over the course of the winter, we have gained some valuable insight into the fine tuning of equipment and techniques needed to make season extension and overwintering possible in these rigid low tunnels. We also have obtained some very good data as to which varieties will work best in this application.

Learn more about Johnny's Selected Seeds Quick Hoops products and season extension, including the federal government's high tunnel pilot program.