Fickle Spears of Fate
Some growers say they think of asparagus as a weed. We prefer to consider it merely excitable.
Few plants react as quickly or as dramatically to changes in the weather. Given a good warm day, an asparagus spear can shoot up 7 to 8 inches, says Bill DePaoli of the California Asparagus Commission. On the other hand, a couple of days of cold, soggy weather can slow its growth to nothing. And a hard freeze can nip it in the bud.
“It’s one of the most sensitive vegetables known to mankind as far as climatic conditions,” DePaoli says. “It reacts to warm and cold, both.”
Matt Seeley, who sells asparagus for Nunes Co., is blunter. “You can never tell what’s going to be there with asparagus,” he says. “It varies by the amount of sunlight, by the temperature and by the ground it’s grown on. Let’s face it, it’s pretty much a weed.”
Right now, anyway, it’s a happy weed, thanks to a warm winter growing season in the Imperial Valley and improving conditions in the primary growing areas in Salinas and the Central Coast. Growers figure it’s about time, after two cold rainy springs in a row.
“These plants have suffered for two years,” says DePaoli. “We’re getting a little concerned about the industry. A lot of these plants have had their feet in water a couple of years now.”
In the Imperial Valley, the tide has definitely turned. DePaoli says shipments so far this year have totaled more than 3 million pounds, compared to only a little more than 1 million last year.
“We’re witnessing some real fine weather,” says DePaoli.
At this point, harvest is just beginning to pick up in the Salinas and Central Coast areas. Right now they’re picking every third or fourth day. When the season really hits, they’ll be in the fields every day.
Of course, there’s a wait-and-see attitude in both areas, because it wasn’t much more than a week ago that those fields were so rain-soaked they could hardly be worked at all.
“By about Feb. 15, we should be harvesting a fair volume,” says DePaoli. “That’s assuming favorable weather, of course. On the other hand, we must be cognizant of the fact that this is Northern California and this is asparagus, and anything can happen.”
