I'm building a new garden in the rear end of our fenced in area. It's not very big, but I'll be doing a lot of companion gardening, and square foot gardening beginning this fall. I have a space about 2' x 3' that is separate from other beds, and gets good morning/early afternoon sun, shade from about 3 - 6pm, then spotty shade till dark.
QUESTION: I believe lettuce will do well in this spot (early spring, and fall plantings). What I don't know is will I have to rotate my lettuce to a different spot every year? I can't seem to find any information about crop rotation for lettuces.
AND if I do have to rotate it... will I be able to plant something like spinach in that spot?
BTW... this is all taking place in NE Texas about half way between Dallas and Tyler.
Lettuce Question
I've never heard of disease problems in lettuce. Slugs can be a big problem. I think that spot gets too much sun for it in the warmer months. Maybe you could interplant with taller stuff to give it some more shade. I find that lettuce can take a lot of heat so long as it's in indirect sun/ bright shade.
I will keep that in mind... I just might need to plant the lettuce somewhere else... Thank you.
I'm in Fort Worth and I planted my lettuce out in the middle of my gardening area last fall. It did great! I think your area will work well for you this fall and spring.
And lettuce is very big on self-seeding, so it will certainly make itself at home once you get it in.
Twigs - what do you do to deter the slugs in the leaf crops? I use Sluggo or Slug-Be-Gone in other parts of the garden, but haven't determined what to sue near the greens. Looks like this is going to be another major slug-year! Icky-poo!!!
Sequee wrote;"lettuce is very big on self-seeding, so it will certainly make itself at home once you get it in."
Sooo, I should let my current plants go to seed when they're ready?
My other question, will they know that I expect them to re-grow this fall? Or will they wait until spring...
LOL, cat...I don't know if southern greens are THAT smart! We northerners don't have THAT issue!
I found it very interresting to note that certain varieties seem to reseed the best. I'd planted a Pinetree Lettuce Mix 3-4 years ago, and over the past 2 years, it's whittled down to 2 varieties. A lovely curly-leafed red, and the romaine. Both very tasty varieties, so I'm thrilled. (The wind, however, does take it to new and exciting areas!)
If you let them go to seed, the seed will land whereve it wants. When the temps are right for germinating, they'll germinate and start growing. However, it may start growing where you don't want it! LOL
Mine are growing on the path between the square foot beds. Cute little heads of romaine sprouting up in several places. Solves the problem of "Now where the devil will i find space to grow THIS?" LOL!
*G*. I like that. Means I have space for lots of lettuce. I'm wondering how long my lettuce is going go without bolting. I have found some plants that are getting "tall", and I think they're getting ready to leave me. I've planted lettuce/salad before, but never actually _ate_ it. I just liked the way it looked. For some reason, this year I am eating it. I started just adding the "thinnings" to store bought romaine (don't ask me why, I have no clue). And I'm hooked! I hate to think that I'll have to buy lettuce for a couple months, until I can plant again in the fall :(. I have a "romaine mix" that I really enjoy, green, red, and speckled. I have the prettiest salads!
Guess I'll have to make do with multi colored 'Maters, beans, okra, and 6 or so kinds of summer squash...
I'm growing lettuce too. Over the past couple days we've had some beautiful weather, in the high 80's, and my lettuce just took off like crazy. I'm just wondering - when can I cut it? It's about 4 inches tall right now, but I can cut it at the soil level and it'll grow back, right?
Do you have A/C in your house? ou might be able to grow it in a window if you do. I can grow lettuce in an east facing window all winter long, so I wonder why the reverse wouldn't be true for you? As long as you have sun and cool enough temps, I'd certainly give it a try. (Or try transplanting some in between the tomatoes. Last year my lettuce kept up pretty much throughout the summer. Granted, it's alot cooler here and it was the world's worst summer, but even so, I did manage to enjoy the fruits of the revious years' labors very late into the season.
I don't know if there's a maturity level that lettuce needs to be at before you can start harvesting it. I'd think you'd need to wait until it's a bit bigger, but what do I know??? Hopefully someone more experienced will drop in with a more expert opinion.
Leaf lettuces are cut and come again. You can pretty much start harvesting a few leaves here and there as soon as they are usable size. I'm still plotting to try and have lettuce and tomatoes to harvest at the same time. Usually gets too cold for the maters in the fall/winter when the lettuce is growing, and too dang hot in the spring/summer when the maters are growing... Waaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh - LOL!
Certainly the gardeners lament. Like, "HELLO! Lettuce AND tomato sandwich!!!"
LOL - I have one of those Aerogardens and I'm seriously thinking I need to grow some lettuce in it over the summer... hee hee hee
BLT here I come!
I am hooked on home grown lettuce. I just need to remember to keep sowing a new crop every few weeks or so. I'm going to try and grow them amongst the tomatoes and the corn during the summer. Buttery soft lettuce leaves with a light drizzle vinaigrette....mmmm....
I don't usually care for the soft lettuces by themselves, but they sure are pretty! If I mix them in with something like romaine, with a crunch, I'm fine. And last night showed me that I'd better try to find a way to grow it inside. Or maybe on the porch. It was getting to be dinner time, and it was beginning to thunder in the distance. Suddenly not so distant. I needed lettuce. It was just too hot to cook anything (the pork tenderloin was going on the grill) and I wanted something other than a totally carnivorous meal. So I ran for it. While I thought the whole time how being the highest object on a hill top reaching to the ground with lots of metal poles around me might not be the brightest location to hang out in a thunderstorm, I got it done :). We all (the lettuces and I) arrived back at the house well washed...
At least you were just washed and not cooked!
Yeah, talk about zapped!
I grow my lettuce in the same bed every year. It gets some shade during the day and I think that extends my lettuce season a bit. I have had the elusive homegrown lettuce and tomato salad a few times, but not for long as the lettuce peters out. I was lazy this past fall and left my lettuce seed heads in the lettuce bed for quite a while before pulling them. My laziness was rewarded by lots of volunteer lettuce this year. It's growing very densely as I didn't thin it and seems happy as can be, in fact this is some of my best lettuce. It just came up in the spring when the time was right. I have some volunteer lettuce in the next bed over, in the wood chips in the path and some in the woods behind my garden. I was surprised that none of the wild critters found the lettuce in the woods and mowed it down. If I attempted to grow it out in the open on purpose, surely it would be gone.
Catmad, you know you can grow your romaine yourself! Most of what came back on it's own for me this year, is romaine!
I do get slugs in my lettuce bed. I went out the other evening to get some lettuce for dinner and it was night of the living slugs. Tons of baby slugs on my beautiful lettuce! Grrr! So I picked all that I could find off of the lettuce, and sprinkled some diatomaceous earth on and around my lettuce. Seemed to do the trick pretty well. I use slug magic around the beds. The instructions state to sprinkle it around the planting bed, so I haven't put it in the beds. Due to the tiny size of the slugs, I'm apt to think they were "born" there in the lettuce bed. Although tedious, nothing works better than picking them off one by one.
You can use Sluggo Plus for the slugs, too. Or, you can put some beer in a shallow container like a small cat food can, tuna can, or the like, sink it in the dirt so that the rim is level with the soil. They'll fall in, get drunk, and die.
That beer thing has never worked for me. Maybe my slugs are hip to that trick.
Or maybe they're in a 12-step or recovery program. :)
Must be a northeast thing. Mine just drink up and slither drunkenly away...
This message was edited May 30, 2010 6:35 AM
The thing I don't like about using beer bait is that you have to dump the things out every morning. Ick!!
"Catmad, you know you can grow your romaine yourself! Most of what came back on it's own for me this year, is romaine!'
Oh, yeah, that's what most of mine is :). I found a big package (cheap) of "Mixed Romaine", and I have the coolest colors!! The rest was a "mesclun" mix, which has the softer letucces. I will plant it again, because it adds interest to the salad. The "boughten" romaine was just when mine was very small, and not enouh for a salad. Now I'm getting enough for a big salad maybe evry other day. I'm beginning to think it's time to go ahead and eat it all, except for a few plants to let go to seed. Can't last much longer...
My volunteers are just now beginning to show up. Makes their third years. And so far it's all Romaine. Last year there was also a red loose leaf, but it hasn't shown up yet. Will be on the lookout for it amongst the soloist cabbage, BS, and Kohlrabi.