Leaf lettuce is usually direct seeded into the garden as early as the soil can be worked up. But if you live where hard spring freezes occur, wait a few weeks until the weather warms up a bit. Plant your lettuce seeds about 1/4 inch deep, aiming for plants to grow about six inches apart. When the seedlings emerge, thin them to stand a foot apart for best growth. I like to start my Romaine and head lettuce indoors about a month before the last spring freezes. Then set the plants out a foot apart. Keep well watered and weeded. Leaf lettuces can be cut and will grow back. Romaine lettuce may be harvested as baby leaves for salads, letting the main head mature. I always save a plant at the end of the row to let go to seed. As lettuce can cross, if you’re growing more than one variety, plant them in different sections of the garden. When the plant bolts upward, it will flower and then set seeds. When they are dry, you can harvest them by cutting the seed stalk into a paper bag then shaking the bag/stalks to encourage seed fall. Store seed in an airtight, rodent/insect-proof container.
Lettuce About 100 seeds per pack
Crisphead
Crisphead If you’ve always wanted to grow head lettuce in your own garden, this is the one for you! It’s an old timer and you know it both tastes good and performs well even in warm weather, forming sweet, crisp heads on only 60 days 100 seeds per pack
Dark Red Lollo Rosso
Dark Red Lollo Rosso This lettuce has it all; it’s gorgeous, outrageously frilly, sweet, tender AND pretty darned hardy. You can cut baby leaves at 30 days or wait to harvest a mature head in about 50 days. What a showgirl! 100 seeds per pack
Paris Island Romaine
Paris Island Romaine Do you want nice, loose heads with hearts that are as sweet and crisp as possible? How about a beautiful light green to pair perfectly with mixed salad greens? And then there’s this open pollinated lettuce’s hardiness. Sound good? We think so! Baby leaves in 30 days and heads in 50 days 100 seeds per pack
Rouge d’Hiver Romaine
Rouge d’Hiver This is a very old heirloom French lettuce which dates back to 1840 or earlier. We love it’s bright color and sweet, crisp leaves. It is very tolerant of cold but becomes bitter when exposed to hot temperatures. I plant it as soon as the soil can be worked in the spring and we harvest luscious heads two months later. It can also be planted as a fall crop or even over-wintered in milder climates. 65 days 100 seeds per pack
