# Stalking the Wild Asparagus & Smelly Urine



## Liver and Onions (Nov 24, 2000)

This small bunch of asparagus is from my 1st search for wild asparagus around May 15th. Did much better my next 2 times out. About 60 years ago I would ride my bike to this corner and pick some for dinner. It's hard to get any here now as a few other pickers visit the corner to get free asparagus also.
As usual, my urine was smelly within about 30 minutes.


----------



## Radar420 (Oct 7, 2004)

Smelly urine? :16suspect

https://www.livescience.com/57199-why-some-people-cant-smell-asparagus-pee.html

I actually can smell it but I had a friend and his entire family couldn't smell it and they never knew it was a thing. They looked at me like I had 2 heads when it came up in conversation once.


----------



## multibeard (Mar 3, 2002)

That is old school asparagus LO

The new hybrid has no taste and I have not smelled the normal asparagus smell when I eat it.

I buy my asparagus from my late friends son that now runs the farm. We got talking about the hybrid stuff and it lack of flavor. He agrees with me about the lack of taste. He said the yield is at lest double of the old stuff if not triple.
If I was going to plant a small patch for my self I would find some Martha Washington seed or another of the old varieties. The old stuff had seed that fed a lot of the wild life from deer to pheasants. One year my buddy shot a buck. When we gutted it I could see the asparagus seed in it's stomach so I opened it to find that is was full of asparagus fern and seeds. I was close to a mile to the nearest asparagus field. 

The problem is it would take. A long time before I would get any thing to eat. Two to three years for the seed that is planted shallow to develop good size crowns. Then it is dug and replanted in a foot deep trench. Three years after that it is ready to be picked a few times. after 5 years you can pick almost all you want.


----------



## eucman (Jan 24, 2009)

Liver and Onions said:


> This small bunch of asparagus is from my 1st search for wild asparagus around May 15th. Did much better my next 2 times out. About 60 years ago I would ride my bike to this corner and pick some for dinner. It's hard to get any here now as a few other pickers visit the corner to get free asparagus also.
> As usual, my urine was smelly within about 30 minutes.
> View attachment 408973


 Believe it or not, pheasant does that to me as well after eating it!


----------



## Liver and Onions (Nov 24, 2000)

eucman said:


> Believe it or not, pheasant does that to me as well after eating it!


You might be one of a kind with that happening. Google search came up empty for smelly urine and pheasant.
Lots of information about smelly urine though. Here is 1 link to urine smelling fishy:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/321478.php

L & O


----------



## eucman (Jan 24, 2009)

Liver and Onions said:


> You might be one of a kind with that happening. Google search came up empty for smelly urine and pheasant.
> Lots of information about smelly urine though. Here is 1 link to urine smelling fishy:
> https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/321478.php
> 
> L & O


I always knew I was special!


----------



## Gamekeeper (Oct 9, 2015)

I unfortunately have asparagus rustlers that work my property.

I would never prosecute them, but I will definitely chew their ass if we meet.


----------



## Thirty pointer (Jan 1, 2015)

Gamekeeper said:


> I unfortunately have asparagus rustlers that work my property.
> 
> I would never prosecute them, but I will definitely chew their ass if we meet.


I have mushroom rustlers down the road they claim they can ride down the road and go 60 ft on everyone else's property looking for mushrooms .They live in a dumpy old trailer and reasoning with them is futile .


----------



## Chessieman (Dec 8, 2009)

Some people it does really make their urine stink. Some even Urine green and I am not talking St. Paddies Day! I have more than my back likes at 240 yard long, that's enough. You can dig up plants by seed but the root ball forms 6" below ground level the first spring. I planted mine in the trough then filled in the trench through a couple years. For your freebies use a GPS in the fall marking the yellow plants that you can get to out of sight of a house in the spring.


----------



## Gamekeeper (Oct 9, 2015)

Chessieman said:


> Some people it does really make their urine stink. Some even Urine green and I am not talking St. Paddies Day! I have more than my back likes at 240 yard long, that's enough. You can dig up plants by seed but the root ball forms 6" below ground level the first spring. I planted mine in the trough then filled in the trench through a couple years. For your freebies use a GPS in the fall marking the yellow plants that you can get to out of sight of a house in the spring.


Hey, don't encourage rustling.


----------



## eucman (Jan 24, 2009)

Liver and Onions said:


> This small bunch of asparagus is from my 1st search for wild asparagus around May 15th. Did much better my next 2 times out. About 60 years ago I would ride my bike to this corner and pick some for dinner. It's hard to get any here now as a few other pickers visit the corner to get free asparagus also.
> As usual, my urine was smelly within about 30 minutes.
> View attachment 408973


Just curious for everyone “Stalking the Wild Asparagus” does wild asparagus taste better or much different than store bought? I never went through the p.i.t. a to grow it.


----------



## multibeard (Mar 3, 2002)

I would think it probably does as it is probably old school not hybrid. If it has berries on it late in the summer it is old school. Hybrid does not have berries and in MHO it does not have the taste of the old school. Like most hybrids it was developed for production and lost a lot of the taste in the process.
You can buy crowns but I would look for some Martha Washington as it is old school. You could start eating it in three years instead of 5 or 6.


----------



## Liver and Onions (Nov 24, 2000)

eucman said:


> Just curious for everyone “Stalking the Wild Asparagus” does wild asparagus taste better or much different than store bought? I never went through the p.i.t. a to grow it.


Next spring we will do a side-by-side taste test to see if we can tell the difference between wild asparagus and asparagus from the store.
I have never noticed or thought about this before until it was mentioned in this thread. Not sure if I can be totally impartial. Things are always better if you catch, kill or pick them yourself.

L & O


----------



## Gamekeeper (Oct 9, 2015)

Mrs. de Jonghe of Grand Rapids Michigan, cloned the first asparagus. Making it machine harvestable, and every spear in the field presuming the same amount of water and nutrients, grows exactly the same size.

I saw a fascinating movie about her her story is truly a rags to riches story.


----------



## eucman (Jan 24, 2009)

Liver and Onions said:


> Next spring we will do a side-by-side taste test to see if we can tell the difference between wild asparagus and asparagus from the store.
> I have never noticed or thought about this before until it was mentioned in this thread. Not sure if I can be totally impartial. Things are always better if you catch, kill or pick them yourself.
> 
> L & O


I agree! 
I grew Yukon gold potatoes and thought “that was easy but no dif in flavor.
Brocolli and tomatoes have awesome home grown taste! If asparagus does too I will start growing it!


----------



## eucman (Jan 24, 2009)

Gamekeeper said:


> Mrs. de Jonghe of Grand Rapids Michigan, cloned the first asparagus. Making it machine harvestable, and every spear in the field presuming the same amount of water and nutrients, grows exactly the same size.
> 
> I saw a fascinating movie about her her story is truly a rags to riches story.


Your side by side taste test reminds me my bro and I a while back comparing fresh red head, mallard, and canvasback breasts off the grill after a Eastern Upper Penninsula Duck Hunt. We decided they were equal.....but might have been the cocktails..


----------



## Gamekeeper (Oct 9, 2015)

Understand that I live on an old truck farm.
There are clumps of asparagus along every ditch, and in every pasture.
Older people clip the ditch stalks every year. It's their spring ritual.

It has a very strong flavor.

The stands in my pasture taste just as strong.

The white and the purple taste like boiled celery to me. Like nothing.

The feral? Strong! Makes your pee not even mix with the water.


----------



## Liver and Onions (Nov 24, 2000)

multibeard said:


> ...........
> If I was going to plant a small patch for my self I would find some Martha Washington seed or another of the old varieties. .


When I read this post a few weeks back, I started thinking about collecting seed late this summer and trying to start a patch on some of my sandy soil area. Yesterday while riding around I could see that there are hundreds of the green berries on the wild asparagus growing on the ditch banks. It may take 6-8 years before I pick my 1st stalk, but I should be around for that.
Wish I had done this 40 years ago.

L & O


----------



## Chessieman (Dec 8, 2009)

Grab the red seeds at the start of fall or when the plant starts to turn yellow. Each red berry has 3 to 4 seeds. Put in freezer right off the bat. Dry out and separate the seeds during the winter at some time. The freeze time must be at least 90 days. Plant after the last frost. The root ball forms about 4 to 6 inches below ground level the first year and will remain at that depth. That is why the preferred method is plant in a trench then gradually fill in. You can buy a clean ounce of seeds from Todd's Seed for about $25 plus shipping. Buy them but you still have to 90 day cold stratify them before planting. I myself soak them for 4 days before putting them in the ground hopefully before a rain.


----------

