Have you ever killed an asparagus plant?

[Barry]

I am about to move some three-year-old asparagus plants from my old to my new allotment.

I have done such a thing in the past, moving some eight-year-old plants about seven years ago. I dug them up as bareroot plants in late winter, stuck them in a raised bed and actually cropped them in April, sparingly, but I did dine on spears. The year afterwards, I picked spears as and when they came up and the plants thrived. Indeed, they are still going strong, seemingly when they should be approaching the end of their lives.

In America, I have even seen advice to the effect that asparagus plants benefit from being divided and then grown on.

My question is this: have you ever managed to kill an asparagus plant? If so, how?

Also, the books claim that an asparagus bed will last ten, fifteen, twenty year. But I have had plants for 20 years and they seem set to keep on cropping forever. Who among you has had an asparagus bed that stopped producing spears? I'm guessing nobody.

Prove me wrong.

[dan3008]

I had a bed stop producing... Over crowding. Dug it up, gave away most the crowns after we devided it, and what we kept is still going strong.

The only asparagus I've killed I was growing in a bucket, and it just didn't thrive. No idea why

[AdeTheSpade]

Yep - I somehow managed to kill off 11 of my 12 that I bought and planted about 3 or 4 years ago - and I have no idea how, except that if I remember correctly it may have been a very harsh winter that year.

[richard p]

i planted some in an odd corner arround 20 years ago ,we had some spears for a couple of years. cant honestly say i killed them but they didnt survive.

[peter]

Never managed to keep what I've bought and planted alive.