Asparagus guild thoughts

Hi y’all I’m going to be putting in asparagus this year and I’m very interested to hear about your guilds that include asparagus.
I’m thinking I will do a hay sheet mulch after planting the crowns to get the bed started, and then interplant either red or white clover to fix nitrogen, and also plant in a few cosmos for aesthetics. I don’t like the look of the ferns very much, and I think they cosmos will match the height and texture of the asparagus and give the illusion that all of the ferns have flowers.
Anyone tried clover with their asparagus? Any problems with the asparagus shoots if the clover cover gets dense?

I have leeks in between my asparagus rows, and this seems to work well. I eat the green tops of the leeks, and leave the bulb. I don't want to disturb the asparagus by digging up the leeks, and I like the greens better, anyway.

I hear people like to plant strawberries with their asparagus. Never tried it, though.

I decided to see if I could find any research on this as I remember reading that asparagus hates weeds, and any plant in the row is going to act like a weed.

I found
https://acsess.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.2134/jpa1995.0035
Asparagus growth was reduced 50% in the first year and 25% in the second year when Asparagus seedlings were planted with clover. I read into that that you can indeed plant clover under your asparagus but wait until the asparagus is established before doing so. As a bonus they found that a mixed clover and rye grass cover reduced weeds to nearly 0 by the second year. that might be worth a 25% reduction in asparagus!

I sowed 150 asparagus seeds last year and had them in a nursery bed, I need to move them very soon to their permanent home, I'm planning on covering with half decayed woodchip, but maybe I should try part of the row with clover. It would be an interesting experiment, I would probably have to label it well though so no one weeded them out!

Pure speculation, but maybe kale, sea kale or beetroots could be good partners for asparagus? Since their original habitat is the same (seashore)? Or maybe it would be the opposite instead, that they are adapted to use the same spectrum of nutrients (the ones found in heaps of decomposing seaweed) and start competing for those if grown in another medium? Dunno...

Eino Kenttä wrote:Pure speculation, but maybe kale, sea kale or beetroots could be good partners for asparagus? Since their original habitat is the same (seashore)? Or maybe it would be the opposite instead, that they are adapted to use the same spectrum of nutrients (the ones found in heaps of decomposing seaweed) and start competing for those if grown in another medium? Dunno...

This reminds me of something I read in "Iverch und Under" that I've been meaning to try for years. One person who wrote in claimed that they had a plot of asparagus (about 1/4 acre!) that grew pretty trouble free.  They said asparagus has an extremely high tolerance for salt, and the field can be salted such that virtually nothing but asparagus can grow in it. This could also apply to other plants like you mention here. Could make interesting ideas for guilds with a very specific weed control method tailored to them.

I’ve interplanted tomatoes with asparagus, and it seems to work well enough. I read, I think in “Carrots Love Tomatoes” that they provide some sort of pest protection for each other.  I have calendula by their feet, which hasn’t exactly thrived in previous seasons. If it doesn’t do well this year, I’m going to take it out.