Asparagus Shape Features for Quality Assessment

Twelve parameters developed from spear boundary data were investigated for grading asparagus in terms of straightness, roundness, and head compactness. For both straightness and compactness, differences were observed between spears manually classified into marketable and cull categories. Spear roundness was not significantly different for the two categories. Asparagus quality, indicated by mean shape parameter values, differed significantly between harvest dates and growers. Classification into marketable and cull categories resulted in error rates of 9 and 31% using a l0-parameter discriminant function and error rates of 13 and 35%, respectively, for a 4-parameter function, compared with manual classification.