How To Grow Picture Perfect Lettuce (For Beginners)

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Growing lettuce is a must in our garden. It is nutritious and delicious, plus it can be grown basically any time of year. In this video, I’ll share how to grow lettuce in your garden from seed to harvest. I also share tips to help your lettuces stay healthy and strong right up until you bring them to the kitchen.

How to make a mini hoop tunnel (shown in video):

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SUPPLIES (affiliate links):

6-cell trays:
6 Cell Plug Tray Inserts Colors

Black trays:
1010 Trays 2.5" Deep Trays – Extra Strength

Humidity dome:
1010 Humidity Dome Tray Lids

Seed starter mix:
https://amzn.to/3TcfIZT

Orange Pump Sprayer:
Kwazar Venus Handheld Pump Sprayer

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SEEDS:

Flashy Trout Back:
https://www.johnnyseeds.com/vegetables/lettuce/romaine-lettuce-cos/flashy-trout-back-organic-lettuce-seed-2716NG.11.html

Buttercrunch:
Buttercrunch Butterhead Lettuce Seeds

Heat tolerant lettuce:
https://www.johnnyseeds.com/vegetables/lettuce/romaine-lettuce-cos/sunland-lettuce-seed-4788.html

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Timestamps:
0:00 Start
0:21 The right type of lettuce to grow
1:19 Planting lettuce seeds
3:34 Lettuce seedling stage
4:16 Preparing the garden soil
4:38 Transplanting lettuce
6:09 Lettuce growing tips
10:04 Harvesting lettuce

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🖥 https://geekygreenhouse.com
🌱 USDA Hardiness Zone: 6b
🌶 https://youtube.com/peppergeek

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Thanks for watching Geeky Greenhouse!
#gardening #plants #vegetables

in this video I’ll show you how to grow picture perfect lettuce from seed to harvest no matter how hot or cold it is in your climate you can grow lettuce pretty much any time of year so in this video I’ll cover everything you need to know from starting seeds indoors to transplanting out into the garden harvesting and I’ll share some critically important tips so that you can have a constant supply of lettuce year round before I get into the planting process I wanted to talk about variety selection and specifically choosing heat tolerant or cold tolerant lettucees based on the time of year all lettucees are fairly cold tolerant but if you want to grow through the winter and you have particularly cold weather you’ll need to select varieties that are very cold hearty leaf lettucees like I’m growing here are a great choice for colder weather all the way up until early summer then you can plant cold tolerant varieties again in mid to late summer for a fall harvest as well but if you want to grow lettuce in midsummer when it’s very hot you’ll need to choose lettucees that are heat tolerant the best option here is usually some type of romaine lettuce which is very good at tolerating the heat and not bolting when it gets too hot so plan ahead a little bit look out one or two months ahead of when you’re planting seed and make sure you’re planting the right type of lettuce so now let’s step back in time to when I planted these lettuce seeds a couple of months ago and go through the entire growing process for planting your seeds here are the basic supplies needed and I’ll provide links in the description in case you need any of these items first some fine potting soil or seed starter mix you can sift normal potting soil to get rid of any larger particles but I always opt for seed starter mix for lettuce since the seeds are so small next you’ll need some seed cells i like using six cell trays anything larger and the seedlings take up more space than is necessary while they’re growing indoors you’ll also need some type of humidity dome whether it’s purpose-built or just a simple covering like a leftover food lid or even just plastic wrap this helps prevent the seeds from drying out while they sprout you’ll need a spray bottle with water to gently moisten the seeds if you have a huge garden I highly recommend a pump sprayer this compact one sprayer is a worthwhile upgrade we recently made for our setup otherwise you can just use a hand sprayer or even just a watering can if you’re growing a few varieties some labels will help keep things organized and of course you’ll need your seeds with everything you need here’s how to plant your lettuce seeds premoisten your potting soil with room temperature water mixing it thoroughly until it’s evenly damp don’t let it get muddy just moist enough to feel like a well-rung out sponge fill the seed cells with the soil pressing down firmly as you go leave about a quarter inch of space to the top and add a label to each container to keep your varieties in order add two to three seeds to the surface of each cell i like adding multiples just in case one doesn’t sprout then barely cover the seeds with a bit of extra soil don’t bury the seeds too deeply as they might not germinate without some light exposure mist the surface of the soil thoroughly to wet the seeds then place the trays under a humidity dome in a room temperature location most lettucees germinate best around 68° F so aim for that if possible and keep the seeds in a nice well-lit location come back daily to check on the seeds for sprouts misting the surface if anything looks like it might be drying out and after just 2 or 3 days you should start seeing your first sprouts emerging from the seeds before I move on from this point I want to talk briefly about succession planting and if you’re not familiar this is a very basic concept of planting new rounds of seeds every 2 to 3 weeks to do this just mark your calendar and repeat the whole planting process every few weeks this way you’ll have a constant supply of lettuce harvests later on remember to adjust the type of lettuce you’re growing to suit the time of year okay so your seedlings have sprouted now you’ll need to provide everything they need to thrive first and most importantly is lighting get the seedlings under grow lights or into a sunny window and of course you can also grow the seedlings outdoors just make sure the young plants are protected from pests and critters by keeping them covered with insect netting and elevated off the ground if you use seed starter mix you may need to fertilize your seedlings a few days after sprouting i like using a basic all-purpose liquid fertilizer to give the seedlings everything they need to grow to the next stage don’t overfertilize though as slow growth is normal at this stage if multiple seeds sprouted in each cell thin the seedlings to one plant per cell you can just pluck the extras leaving the healthiest looking seedling to grow while your seedlings are growing it’s a great time to prepare a space in your garden for planting choose a nice sunny spot for planting and since lettuce is grown purely for its leaves we need to amend the soil with nitrogen-rich ingredients these can include things like compost organic slowrelease fertilizer blood meal rotted manurses or fermented alphaalfpha work these amendments into the first 2 or 3 in of soil a few weeks before planting your lettuce out after 2 to 3 weeks of growth your seedlings should look something like this and are ready to move into their final home to transplant lettuce seedlings dig out small holes in the soil every 8 to 10 in or so you can space them closer for an earlier harvest or for smaller leaf lettuce or even farther apart for larger varieties like Roma but 8 to 10 in should work for pretty much any type of lettuce gently remove a seedling from its cell by squeezing the outside of the container and punching it out through the bottom the root should be reaching the bottom and sides of the soil but ideally not circling around too much plant the seedling in a pre-dug hole back filling the soil so the plant is at the same level it was at in its seed cell after all the plants are planted I like to cover the surrounding soil with a 1 to two inch layer of natural mulch like shredded leaves or straw this is optional and if slugs are a particular concern in your area you may want to skip it but mulch can help suppress weeds and keep the soil from drying out then give the plants a modest watering to help them settle into their new environment lastly and this is optional but I like to keep lettuce covered with insect netting from this point forward this prevents caterpillars aphids and other pests from doing damage to your plants and can also keep rabbits and deer away from your young seedlings we have a video about how I built this small hoop covering which I’ll link below but there are many ways to easily drape insect netting over your garden to keep it protected this one step can make a huge difference in the health of your plants and the overall success of your lettuce if you skip it for now and run into trouble with your plants later on you can always come back to this optional step for future plantings now before I get to harvesting which I can’t wait to do I wanted to share some tips to help you be more successful growing lettuce in your garden number one be mindful of pests there are countless pests that can eat your lettuce including slugs caterpillars beetles aphids leaf miners and many more and covering your lettuce plants seems to be the best option here we’ve tried many different ways of protecting our plants from pests and just covering with insect netting is incredibly effective and I think this is probably the number one thing that we do that keeps our plants looking so beautiful you can also come out and handp pick off any pests if you have slugs or caterpillars you’ll need to come out and remove those by hand that’s the best way since you’re eating the leaves it’s not a great idea to spray any pesticides on your plants do your best to identify the pest that you have in your garden and deal with it accordingly some other advice on pests is to keep the plants as healthy as possible make sure they have the nutrients that they need lots of nitrogen in the soil to keep the plants healthy and allow them to defend themselves against pests and disease and lastly plant some companion crops you can see some alysum over here and some zenyas coming up those will attract beneficial insects to your garden which will feast on things like thris and aphids and many other pests in your garden more diversity in the garden is always better number two is to not only plant the right variety for the time of year those cold tolerant or heat tolerant but also to plant fresh and high quality grade seeds lettuce seeds can last for several years i’ve planted seeds as old as 3 years old and they’ve sprouted no problem but if you do have older lettuce and you’re planning on growing it I do recommend performing a simple germination test just plant a bunch of seeds on the soil and see what percentage of them come up that way you’ll know if your seeds are viable and whether or not they’ll be reliable when it comes time to plant in addition to making sure your seeds are viable it’s also important to shop around for highquality varieties that are disease resistant or heat tolerant cold tolerant bolt resistant and of course whether they have a good flavor and will grow well in your zone i always recommend talking to gardeners in your actual area if you have a neighbor who likes their garden ask them what lettucees they’ve grown in the past with success and you can learn a lot about your specific climate that way the last tip pertains to avoiding bitter lettuce and avoiding bolting both of these relate directly to temperature most lettucees will start bolting when it gets a bit too hot for that specific variety heat tolerant varieties of course are going to be able to withstand much higher temperatures but the cooler season crops like these here are not happy that it’s about 80° out right now and for that reason I’ll be harvesting these soon and that’s the first thing you can do is just harvest promptly if you know there’s some hot weather coming up or your lettucees are getting pretty big you can just harvest early the leaves will be nice and sweet and crisp when they’re young and there’s no problem with harvesting early the other thing you can do is to provide some shade for your lettuce and this is pretty important if you do want to grow throughout the summer even if you’re choosing those Roma varieties that are heat tolerant providing some shade during the hottest part of the day or during a heat wave when temperatures are above 90° Fahrenheit or so will do a lot to cool down the temperature around the plants if you don’t want to invest in shade cloth you can also just deliberately plant your lettucees behind something taller like say a tomato or cucumber something tall that can cast some shade on your lettucees during the midday or in the afternoon so you can plant on the north side of something much taller so that that shade casts onto your lettuce at the right time of day now on the contrary there is a reason that you might want to let your lettuce go and bolt what happens with lettuce bolts is it shoots up tall it flowers and eventually it will go to seed if you want to save your own lettuce seed maybe you have an heirloom variety that is delicious and grows well in your climate you’ll need to allow it to flower and go to seed and if you don’t mind a chaotic garden you can also just allow the seeds to fall into the surrounding soil producing tons of volunteer lettuce seedlings which will grow into more lettuce plants okay now the moment I’ve been waiting for harvesting your lettuce and there are really just two ways of doing this the easiest way is the one that I prefer which is just uprooting the entire plant and replacing it with another lettuce seedling or another plant entirely into the garden the other option involves removing outer leaves you can just pull back some of the foliage and remove the outermost leaves and sort of work your way towards the middle allowing the plant to stay in the garden longer and continue growing from the center that does last a little bit longer and if you don’t need an entire head of lettuce or you don’t want to move it out of the garden yet maybe you don’t have something else to replace it this is a great way to sort of prolong the lettuce’s life as long as there’s no threat of really hot weather or causing the plant to bolt this is fine but like I said my favorite method is to just remove the entire plant and I think this one is the most ready here so if you just pull back the foliage gently pull up shake off the excess soil and there we have it a beautiful head of lettuce this is the flashy trout back variety i love this i’ve been growing it for years and it just produces these huge heads nice gorgeous leaves you can use these for wraps you can use them in salads of course they’re just amazing and the best way to enjoy them is fresh out of the garden right after you pick it so I think I’m going to head inside and enjoy a salad i hope this video helps you find success growing lettuce in your garden let me know your favorite lettuce varieties i’m always curious to try new lettucees in the garden there are just so many and I’m sure other viewers will also appreciate your suggestions thanks so much for watching Geeky Greenhouse and I’ll see you soon