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Lettuce is one of the crops that grow in most climates, with a minimum of care, and the result is nearly always better than anything you can buy in the store.

There are two main forms of lettuce; leaf lettuce and head lettuce. In general, head lettuce is a little slower growing; to it requires more time to become mature. However, when grown in rich soil and when watered well, the heads can be enormous when compared to the ones you will find in the produce section of the local grocery store.

Lettuce will grow indoors, in containers, provided that it gets plenty of light. Even in the garden, it grows the best when it has plenty of direct sunlight during the day.

Wild lettuce still grows through much of the world, and it is also edible, though it tends to be bitter. The milky white juice is slightly narcotic in the wild variety, and this is what gives it the bitter flavor. Domesticated lettuce can also be mildly bitter if they are not in fairly good soil and aren't given plenty of water.

To grow lettuce, dig a shallow straight furrow no more than an inch deep. Lettuce seeds are small; so you can mix them with soil, and then sprinkle the soil/seed mixture into the rows.

Tamp the soil down well to hold the seeds in place.

Lettuce usually germinates in a week to ten days. It should be thinned as it grows so that each lettuce plant has plenty of room to expand. Head lettuce will require more room between the plants than will leaf lettuce.

Leaf lettuce can be harvested by just picking the larger outer leaves, and allowing the remaining plant to grow, so that more leaves can be harvested later.

This allows you to have a continuous supply of lettuce without replanting. However, lettuce bolts easily (goes to bloom and produces seeds), so it also isn't difficult to plant successive crops of lettuce. Since it takes only about a month and a half for leaf lettuce to grow to harvestable size, it isn't difficult to continually plant throughout the season without even purchasing more seed.

The biggest pests of lettuce are rodents, deer, slugs, snails, and earwigs, because of how succulent the plant is. However, each of these pests is controllable, and there are many other articles that deal with pest controls.

Lettuce isn't hard to grow, it grows in most climates, it doesn't take long to grow, it stretches dinner substantially, and it will grow in most soils though it does best in the richest soil. If you are planning your garden, lettuce should at least be one of the main considerations for vegetables to grow.

Learn more about this author, Rex Trulove.
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