The asparagus is up !

[Liver and Onions]

The first few stalks are up a few inches in my garden. Not everyone cares for asparagus, but I like it. The only thing I don't like about asparagus is that it makes my urine smell !
When I was a kid I can remember a few times that we were able to have brook trout, morels and asparagus all caught or picked on the same day. A good meal made special because it wasn't purchased.
L & O

[kingfisher2]

Thanks, L & O...asparagus usually doesn't get up for me until the week after opening day....Glad you made a post, now I'll stop on my way west next Tuesday and get a bunch! I love fresh asparagus, steamed until it can "snap" and dipped in Miracle Whip.

[fishandhunt]

Hopefully I can find some this weekend, gotta beat the old guy to the spot though:D Nothing like checking your spot and finding stumps.

[Liver and Onions]

fishandhunt,
I don't know if the wild asparagus is up yet. I believe that the black soil in the garden (solar heating affect) gets the asparagus up a few days earlier than the wild stuff.
L & O

[Outdoorzman]

Just an interesting tidbit:

Why does asparagus make your pee smell funny?

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Dear Cecil:

My faith in you remains unshaken and my respect for the sagacity of your judgment undiminished. However, I am afraid that, as Mitzi Malone might say, your interlocutors have gotten pretty weenie.

What you need are some good questions, such as the following: Why does my urine smell funny after I've eaten asparagus? --F.K., Dallas, Texas

Dear F.:

I have probably been asked this question a dozen times since I started this job. The first ten times I dealt with it as you might expect. I burned the letter, had the room fumigated, and prayed for the writer's immortal soul.

This week, however, I have gotten the question twice in the same mail. This leads me to believe this is something the Teeming Millions truly yearn to know, God help us. So I give up. Here's the story:

Many sagacious persons have noted the peculiar effect of certain products on human urine.

For example, Benjamin Franklin, in a wide-ranging discussion of bodily discharges, once noted, "a few stems of asparagus eaten shall give our urine a disagreeable odor; and a pill of turpentine no bigger than a pea shall bestow upon it the pleasing smell of violets."

It is said that in a venerable British men's club there is a sign reading "DURING THE ASPARAGUS SEASON MEMBERS ARE REQUESTED NOT TO RELIEVE THEMSELVES IN THE HATSTAND."

Serious scientific research in this field dates back to 1891, when M. Nencki tentatively identified a compound known as methanethiol as the culprit. The odor appears within an hour after eating just a few spears of the offending vegetable.

According to Allison and McWhirter (1956), the ability to produce the odor is controlled by a single autosomal (i.e., non-sex-related) dominant gene. In a sample of 115 persons, 46 were rendered fragrant by asparagus and 63 were not. (This leaves 6 mysteriously unaccounted for. Urology is an inexact science, I guess.)

In 1975 one Robert H. White, then with the chemistry department at the University of California at San Diego, found that the odor-causing chemical was not methanethiol after all.

Instead, using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (Bob was obviously not one to screw around), he found that the aroma was in fact caused by several S-methyl thioesters, specifically S-methyl thioacrylate and S-methyl 3-(methylthio)thiopropionate.

(Thioesters are compounds that result from the reaction of an acid with a sulfur-containing alcohol. They tend to be smelly.)

I know you are very interested in all this stuff and are following me closely, F., so I am going to give you the exact chemical formulation for these chemicals, in case somebody asks you at some fancy social soiree.

The thioacrylate recipe is:

CH2=CHC(=O)SCH3

The thiopropionate is:

CH3SCH2CH2C(=O)SCH3

We are faking the above somewhat given the limitations of the ASCII character set, but I know you are grateful for whatever information we can provide.

Anyway, sez Bob, the "metabolic origin [of the compounds--i.e., how and why they end up in the urine] remains an open question." I can't exactly say that research is continuing, but if anything develops I'll let you know.

--CECIL ADAMS

[Liver and Onions]

Wow ! Guys actually relieved themselves in the hatstand ? I'm surprised that only 40 % are affected with smelly urine after eating the green vegetable. I had some today for lunch.....and the usual affect was detected within the hour.
L & O

[Outdoorzman]

Yeah, it's pretty weird. Asparagus has not affected me in this way until recently.

[Banditto]

Just wanted to ring in with a quick note. I have been tending some food plots for the past 8 weekends. The wild asparagus patches I know have been producing well for 3 weeks. Enough to feed 8 people once a week.

Strange thing is, a family of deer decided to bed right on top of the patches! In fact those buggers are eating the tender tips off some of them.

I will exact my revenge this fall! This is personal now!