Lettuce Confessions

The fourth planting of lettuce will be ready very soon

I planned to have a continuous supply of lettuce almost all season long; from the first delivery through mid-October. During my winter planning, I figured out how often and how much I needed to plant at a time, determined by how long each planting would last, both in terms of maturity of the vegetable and how fast it would sell. Last year, the lettuce plan went pretty well, so I kept it pretty much the same, with changes in some varieties of lettuce. I also planned where each planting would go. That is the part of the plan I never quite finished. I found beds for the first few plantings and then I got distracted. I kept thinking I would get back to it, but never did.

This lettuce is ready to harvest now, then the cucmbers can take over

For the first six plantings of lettuce, everything worked out fine. I squeezed lettuce into beds with other crops while they were small, like kale and cucumbers. I had some beds planned just for lettuce. Now I am scrambling a bit more. I think I found a bed for the seventh and eighth batches of lettuce, but only because my starts on those two batches didn’t do well and I won’t have as much to plant. (I think it may have been too hot in the hoop house where one batch was germinating. For the other, it may have been slugs that took down my little starts, as they do climb up the table where the trays sit.) Unfortunately, I also got behind in the seeding schedule and skipped the ninth batch. I planted out the sixth planting Wednesday and I seeded the tenth batch yesterday. There are only three more sets to go, so I should be able to seed those on schedule.

Jester, a new variety this year, planted out Wednesday

There may not be as much lettuce as planned around the end of August and the beginning of September. Good thing the tomatoes and cucumbers should be in full swing by then…a few weeks for Greek salads, before more lettuce is ready.