How to Grow Lettuce:
Fresh Salads All Season

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Why lettuce bolts

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Types of Lettuce

Loose-leaf lettuce is the easiest, and the best choice for beginners. You pick the outer leaves and the plant keeps growing. Knowing the types makes it easier to learn how to grow lettuce for every season.

Iceberg is the hardest to grow, needing a long, cool season to form heads. The leafy types are easier, and their green leaves are more nutritious than pale iceberg heads.

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Best Lettuce Varieties

Grow a mix: a fast loose-leaf for steady picking, a butterhead for flavor, and a romaine or summer crisp for warm weather. A mixed lettuce seed packet gives you many kinds at once.

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When and Where to Plant Lettuce

Lettuce is a cool-season crop. It grows best between 45°F and 65°F and bolts in steady heat above about 75°F. It handles light frost but not a hard freeze. Cool weather is the heart of how to grow lettuce well.

• Spring: sow outdoors 2 to 4 weeks before your last frost.
• Fall: sow 6 to 8 weeks before your first fall frost. Fall lettuce is often the sweetest of the year.
• Summer: grow heat-tolerant types in afternoon shade, or take a break until late summer.

Lettuce is one of the few vegetables that likes some shade. Full sun is best in spring; morning sun with afternoon shade is ideal as it warms up. See vegetable garden shade.

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Soil for Lettuce

Lettuce likes loose, moist, well-drained soil with lots of compost, and a pH of 6.0 to 6.8. Its shallow roots dry out fast, so compost that holds moisture makes a big difference. Rich, moist soil is a big part of how to grow lettuce that stays sweet.

Feed lightly. Compost usually gives lettuce enough nitrogen. Too much fertilizer can make leaves bitter.

Raised beds are perfect for lettuce. In one square foot you can grow 4 butterheads or up to 16 loose-leaf plants. See raised bed gardening.

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How to Plant Lettuce

Plant lettuce seed very shallow, just 1/8 to 1/4 inch deep. Some lettuce needs light to sprout, so barely cover it with fine soil. Planting too deep is the most common reason for poor germination.

• Germination: best at 55°F to 65°F; poor above 75°F. Keep the soil surface moist.
• Thinning: loose-leaf 4 to 6 inches apart; butterhead and romaine 8 to 12 inches; crisphead 10 to 12 inches. Eat the thinnings as baby lettuce!
• Rows: 12 to 18 inches apart.
• Transplants: start indoors 4 to 6 weeks early in cell trays kept around 50°F to 60°F, and set them out with 2 or 3 true leaves. Lettuce transplants easily.
• Seed: buy fresh seed each year, or keep opened packets sealed in the refrigerator.

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Plant a Little Every Two Weeks

Small, frequent sowings beat one big planting. Lettuce is ready all at once and doesn't wait. Sow a few seeds every 2 to 3 weeks from early spring to late spring, pause in the heat of summer, then start again in late summer for fall. This is how to grow lettuce for salads all season instead of all at once.

How much to plant: about 3 to 4 plants per person per sowing is plenty for most families.

With a cold frame, you can pick lettuce well into winter in mild climates.

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Watering and Care

Steady water is the key to sweet, tender lettuce. Lettuce is about 95% water. If it dries out, the leaves turn bitter and the plant bolts sooner. If you remember one thing about how to grow lettuce, make it steady water.

• Water when the top inch of soil feels dry; every 2 to 3 days in cool weather, daily in heat.
• Water in the morning so leaves dry by afternoon.
• Mulch with 1 to 2 inches of straw or shredded leaves, kept back from the stems.
• Keep the bed weeded; lettuce doesn't like competition.

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How to Harvest Lettuce

Cut-and-come-again is the secret to months of salads. Cut the outer leaves 1 to 2 inches above the soil and leave the center to keep growing. Take no more than a third of the plant at once. New leaves are ready in 7 to 10 days.

Or cut the whole plant about 2 inches above the soil; it will often regrow in 2 to 3 weeks. Harvest heading types whole once the heads are firm.

Pick in the cool of the morning. Rinse in cold water, spin dry, and store in a container with a damp paper towel in the refrigerator. It keeps 5 to 7 days.

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How to Keep Lettuce from Bolting

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Lettuce bolts when hot weather and long days tell it to make seed. It sends up a tall stalk and the leaves turn bitter, sometimes in less than a week of heat. Keeping it from bolting is the hardest part of how to grow lettuce in summer.

• Grow lettuce in spring and fall, not midsummer.
• Choose bolt-resistant varieties like summer crisp, romaine, and Red Sails.
• Give it afternoon shade, from shade cloth or taller plants like tomatoes or pole beans.
• Keep the soil evenly moist; dry spells speed up bolting.
• Pinch out the center if you see a stalk starting, to buy a few more days.

Once leaves turn bitter, pull the plant and sow again. See growing lettuce in hot weather.

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How to Grow Lettuce in Containers

Lettuce is one of the best vegetables for pots. It has shallow roots, grows fast, and doesn't mind close spacing.

• Use a pot at least 6 inches deep for loose-leaf, 8 to 10 inches for butterhead and romaine, with drainage holes.
• A 12-inch pot holds 4 to 6 loose-leaf plants.
• Fill with potting mix and keep it evenly moist.
• Move pots to full sun in spring and fall, and into afternoon shade in summer.

Indoors, lettuce needs a sunny, cool window or a grow light. See growing lettuce indoors and container gardening.

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Common Lettuce Problems

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Saving Your Own Lettuce Seed

Save seed only from open-pollinated (non-hybrid) varieties; hybrids don't come true from seed.

• Choose your best plants, the ones slowest to bolt.
• Let them bolt and flower. The seed stalks mature in late summer or fall.
• Collect the fluffy seed heads when dry. Dry them in the sun for a day or two, bringing them in at night.
• Store seed in a dry glass jar in a cool, dark place.

Lettuce mostly pollinates itself, but for the purest seed keep different varieties a few feet apart.

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Lettuce Questions

How long does lettuce take to grow?

Loose-leaf is ready for its first picking in 30 to 45 days, baby leaves in about 3 to 4 weeks. Butterhead takes 50 to 60 days, romaine 60 to 75.

Why does my lettuce taste bitter?

Usually because it's starting to bolt from heat or dry soil. Pick often, give it shade and steady water, and grow it in cool weather.

Can lettuce grow in shade?

In part shade, yes. 3 to 4 hours of sun is enough for loose-leaf lettuce, though it grows slower. Deep shade is too dark.

How much lettuce should I plant?

About 3 to 4 plants per person, sown every 2 to 3 weeks, so you don't have more than you can eat.

Can I grow lettuce in winter?

In mild climates, yes, with a cold frame or row cover and cold-hardy varieties like Winter Density. Indoors, grow baby lettuce under a grow light.

Source: University of California Cooperative Extension.

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More Lettuce and Vegetable Guides

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