Wild Asparagus

I blogged early this spring about trying my hand at growing asparagus and am glad to report that it’s still doing great!  Although I have yet to read that asparagus makes a reappearance in the fall, mine did.  I planted it early this year, it sprouted, suffered through out hot dry summer, died off, and now I have new asparagus shoots all ferned out and looking good.  I give you this information just in case you’re not familiar with the growing patterns of this particular plant.  I know I’m not, but I’m learning fast! 

So, to get to the ‘wild’ part that the title of this post suggests – the power company came by a couple months ago and cleared a big swath of ground (looks HUGE to me) near our fence line.  The cedar trees there were coming just a little too close to the power lines.  We had not gone in there much because the trees were very thick.   Since I had no say in the matter, I decided to try to make the most of it and have decided it is a nice wide path to walk the dog along.  What did I find the other day but something that looks like just the asparagus in the raised bed!  Here’s a picture of the wild plant, followed by a picture of the asparagus in the raised bed.  

There is evidence that there were other, similar plants growing nearby at some time this year.  I don’t know if the utility workers ran any over or not, but I expect if there had been any, they wouldn’t have been able to avoid it. 

I have done enough research online to know that asparagus does grow wild and some people go foraging for it.  Stories abound about family outings looking for wild asparagus much the same as my family used to go looking for wild mushrooms.  I’m not ready to declare this asparagus yet, but am planning on putting a wire basket around it and checking it again in the spring.  If it is what I think it is, it should sprout about the same time as it’s cousin in the raised bed.  I’ll let you know what I find out!