1st year asparagus plants?

Question

Do you let them go to seed? Or cut them?

Answer 1

let them go to seed and remember your not sposed to cut from them after june 1st :)

Answer 2

Do not harvest your asparagus the year you plant it or the year following planting. The asparagus plant needs to grow and establish a healthy crown and it will need all of its energy to do that. The third-year after transplanting we generally harvest the field for about two weeks. A better way to look at it is in terms of the number of pickings. We try to harvest fields 8 to 12 times the first year of harvest. Which number we use depends on the strength of the field. A picking is taken whenever the spears get tall enough to harvest, usually between 8 and 10 inches, which may be every day in warm weather or every four days in very cool weather. In warmer weather you will find that tip quality will be better if the spears are picked at the shorter end of this size range. The second year of harvest we will pick the field for about four weeks and the third year of harvest we will pick for a full season which is six or seven weeks. In terms of number of harvests for a full-season, figure 22-24 harvests. Harvests may be more or less than that depending on the strength of the field indicated by carbohydrate storage in the roots. However, most gardeners lack access to the modern tools needed to measure those levels. One thing you can use as a guide is the number and diameter of the spears you are harvesting. If the number of spears in a harvest drops off dramatically beyond 15 pickings or so, or if the spear diameter drops, you may want to consider ending harvest early. These yield drops are a good sign that the crown is beginning to experience stress.