Last Monday, my Jersey Supreme asparagus crowns arrived from Johnny's Selected Seeds. Excellent! I thought, and ran out to my garden to plant them. Then I read the instructions, which specified working compost into the soil. I'm out of compost; one tumbler keeps almost-but-not-quite being ready. So I sighed, deposited the crowns in the greenhouse, and went back to whatever I was doing.
Meanwhile, my friend Megan offered me some finished compost in exchange for some of the bazillion volunteer strawberries I dug out of the beds and paths last Saturday. On Wednesday, we met up in Burlington and exchanged organic matter.
And then it rained. And rained. And rained some more. I kept spraying the crowns with water to keep them from drying out and praying for a break in the weather. We had a nice break yesterday, but with my husband sick and a crazy work week, I was just too tired to do much of anything. This morning, I woke up and peeked out the curtains at a lovely blue sky.
Aha! Asparagus time! After breakfast, I went outside and weeded out the bed. Then I dumped the compost on it. Bonus: it was chock full of very happy, wriggling worms! I weeded an adjoining bed for a few minutes to give them time to settle down, then I pulled out my cultivator and worked that compost in.
I dug a trench and put down some crowns, but I still had some left. So I dug the trench a bit farther and put down some more crowns, and there were still some left. I just kept going and going and going until I'd dug a 25-foot trench in the long bed at the foot of the garden. It was starting to sprinkle. I had seven crowns left, but I didn't really want to extend the trench further and encroach on other growing spaces. So I took the crowns next door, along with my remaining volunteer strawberries, and deposited them all upon my delighted neighbors. As I covered the crowns, it gently began to rain.
It'll be interesting to see the effect of the compost, since I only worked it into the first half of the trench. Otherwise, it was a pretty perfect morning in the garden. I can't wait to see what comes up.
Susan will be happy to know the worms found a good home. She spent a long time talking about her worms and that we were giving them to you. (Her favorite part of gardening is digging up worms and finding them families because they are lonely.)
ReplyDelete(Alas I will not be able to plant my strawberries today because I have a family thing this afternoon.)
Now I just have to figure out what to give away compost in since we've switched to cat litter that comes in bags.