ed in around the
advancing shoots till the soil is level. Now give a dressing of 1,000
pounds per acre, alongside the rows, of a mixture of 900 pounds of acid
phosphate, 500 pounds of fish scrap, 200 pounds of nitrate of soda, and
400 pounds of muriate of potash, and keep the plants cultivated
shallowly and flat with an ordinary cultivator till the tops are mature.
An application of salt may be useful if applied in the fall in making
some matters in the soil available, but salt in itself is of no use
whatever to the plants. We would never apply salt in the spring, as it
has a tendency to lessen nitrification and to retard the earliness of
the shoots.

The annual dressing of the fertilizer named should now be increased to a
ton per acre, and it should be applied not later than February 1st in
each year. After the tops have been cut in the fall it is a good plan to
plow furrows from each side over the rows and to plow out the middles,
for the shoots will always start earlier in an elevated ridge, which
warms up earlier in the spring.

The second year after planting cutting may begin, and the shoots must be
cut as fast as they show, care being taken to cut down near the crown of
the roots, but not to injure the other shoots that may be starting.
After cutting is over--and the length of time the bed should be cut is
of little importance in the South, for the price at the point where it
is shipped will always tell you when to stop--the soil should be again
worked down flat, and if the growth has not been as satisfactory as
could be wished, a dressing of 100 pounds per acre of nitrate of soda at
this time will usually pay very well. Asparagus should always be bunched
in a machine made for that purpose. The bunches are packed in crates
just deep enough to hold the bunches set upright on a bed of moss, and a
cover of the same damp moss should be placed on top.

Where there is a demand for green asparagus the planting should be done
more shallowly in a simple furrow, and the entire culture should be flat
and shallow. The shoots are cut at the surface of the ground after they
have attained the proper length. One thing is to be observed in either
method, and this is that during the cutting season everything long
enough must be cut daily, and that the little shoots be not allowed to
run up and branch out. Cull the shoots after they are all out and bunch
accordingly. Green shoots should be bunched by themselves and not mixed
with