Several weeks ago I agreed with Sandy Oliver’s sentiment noted in this blog: that dining on homegrown asparagus makes one feel like royalty. After a few weeks of asparagus every night, though, I was ready for the spinachy life of a pauper.

We persevered. Steamed asparagus, sautéed asparagus, asparagus casseroles, scrambled eggs and asparagus, asparagus in salads… Seeing a pound of organic asparagus selling for $6.99 imparted a new flavor to these dishes…for another week or so.

But we persevered some more because keeping an asparagus plot
completely cut every day for the entire harvest season is one way to
foil the asparagus beetle. With no spears or fronds to feed on and lay
its eggs on, populations of this pest—whose larvae can devour a row of
asparagus ferns, putting next year’s crop in jeopardy—decline.

Any asparagus beetle eggs that are laid may, according to Ruth
Hazzard of the University of Massachusetts, be parasitized by a tiny
wasp named Tetrastichus asparagi that feeds on and lays its own eggs in
asparagus beetle eggs. Having nectar sources such as umbelliferous
flowers growing near the asparagus plot can encourage these beneficial
insects, although Hazzard says the wasps may not be enough to prevent
economic damage to a plot. Still, I was pleased to see a few dill
plants (which have the characteristic umbel-shaped flowers)
volunteering in the asparagus row, verifying what I told the Mormons
who came down the driveway the other day: Yes, I do believe in a higher
power. Nature!

And while sowing a row of ‘Space’ spinach at the base of the
asparagus row last week (a good place for summer spinach—it gets a
little shade here, and tending the spinach reminds me to keep the
asparagus row weeded), I noticed a green lacewing, another beautiful
and beneficial insect, alighting on the dill foliage—which, probably
not coincidentally, is the same shade of green as the lacewing. Higher
powers to the nth degree!

Jean English is the editor of MOFGA’s, The Maine Organic Farmer & Gardener.