[digby]

This year I bought a couple of cheap asparagus crowns from the garden centre and popped them in a couple of months ago.  1 already had a small spear on one of the crowns, which subsequently died off with the frost - however, I was delighted when it popped up another one about 2 weeks ago.

Then comes the problem, my 2 beautiful cats, who I love dearly but wish they'd stay off my veggie patch were enjoying the sun on Saturday and they broke of the tip of this single spear, it's the tasty bit at the end so does this mean the plant will now die completely or is is just a temporary set back?

I think they've already ruined my parsnip crop, and my carrots and lettuces were certainly sown in straight lines but you wouldn't think it to look at them now.

[JayG]

My asparagus were planted as crowns 5 years ago and have really only recently got going properly (and even now some are more vigorous than others.)

If you can't resist picking newly-planted asparagus (or have a cat!) the most important thing to do is to make sure you don't pick the last few spears before the plant is too knackered to produce another, as of course it is essential to allow spears to grow into ferns during to summer to build up the crown for next year.

Be nice to them, cross your fingers, and hope! 

[Trillium]

It's quite likely the plant will put out another spear as this is how it feeds itself. And until the plant(s) is old enough for harvesting you might want to enclose the asparagus patch with a small cage area made of chicken wire and something for support posts like canes or 2x2's and of course a wire cover. Any fern growth can grow through the top but at least the base areas aren't snapped off short.

If you have the patience, train your cats to stay out of the veg bed. It can be done. I trained my dog to stay off all my veg areas and now she even chases off other cats and dogs who wander there.

[Goosegirl]

I have four cats and one of them loves my raised asparagus bed - I don't know why! It's surrounded on three sides by pallets and I have a length of horizontal clematis netting over the ferns about 3' from the edge of the bed to prevent the wind from rocking them. I bought some more netting which I plan to put on the open side so she can't get it (when I get over this nasty cold/flu thingy!)