April 26th, 2021

The lettuces I’m growing are Saragossa, a German summer crisp lettuce, and Forellenschluss, a German lettuce with red spots. Most of the seed was started in trays indoors, but I also started some in milk jugs outside, and those have the brightest colors and the strongest growth. I often wonder about the early life of the seeds that are sown, and how much the way they are grown will make a difference. Infancy is a mysterious time.

I’ve spent so much time planting trees this spring that I felt a little sorry for the lettuces as I put them out. They are short-lived plants that won’t see the end of summer. This quick lifecycle was the original blessing of lettuce- the Egyptians grew them for oil seed, not for the leaves. Now lettuce leaves are everywhere, but you can’t find the seed oil. They say it’s good for your hair and good for sleep, but I don’t know if that’s true.
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I never liked lettuce as a kid, but there are a lot of things I learned to love by learning to grow. The real lettuce enthusiast is my oldest daughter. She’s the reason I’m growing mostly head lettuce this year and a lot of it (I’m also growing the German Saragossa lettuce and maybe a bit of that great Australian yellow as well, though it doesn’t go with my general scheme.)

Last year I covered the spring greens with landscape fabric. It worked well, but it’s not the nicest thing to look at so this year I’m going without. Wes Jackson says the world has always been more beautiful than it is useful, and that might as well be true in the lettuce patch.