Salad days - growing lettuce varieties - includes list of nursery sources

Flower & Garden Magazine, Feb-March, 1994 by Wilfred Wooldridge

I CAN REMEMBER, NOT TOO MANY years ago, being aware of only two types of lettuce -- iceberg head lettuce and looseleaf lettuce. Those are still among the most commonly grown salad greens and while there's nothing wrong with them, you'll be penalizing yourself if you neglect the others. The lettuce family has since grown; there are now more than 800 named varieties, about 275 of which are available to gardeners in this country.

Over the years hardy and climate-adaptable strains have been developed, some more heat-tolerant than others. In general, though, lettuce thrives best as a cool-weather crop in spring and fall. One of its finest attributes is its rapid maturity, which permits gardeners to harvest 45 to 75 days after sowing seed.

There are four main types of lettuce: butterhead, crisphead, looseleaf and romaine. These should all be represented in the well-rounded kitchen garden, because each contributes unique flavor and texture to the salad bowl.

Butterhead. This is the largest group and the most popular in Europe and the United States, where it is also known as bibb. These lettuces are fragile and difficult to market, but make a great green for the home garden. Of this group perhaps the most familiar is |Buttercrunch.'

Butterheads form soft, loose heads, which vary from deep green to red, depending on the strain. They blanch to lighter color on the inner leaves. The leaves are succulent and flavorful.

Crisphead. This familiar iceberg-type lettuce forms tight, firm heads. There are red and green-leafed varieties, all of which have juicy, crisp leaves. The crispheads are less tasty than many other lettuces, but lend welcome body and crunch to salads. They also moderate the potent taste of other robustly flavored salad greens, with which they can be beautifully combined.

Looseleaf. These rapidly maturing lettuces form no heads, but, instead, develop loose central rosettes of leaves. Being exposed to light, leaves remain unblanched. Lack of blanching results in more flavorful leaves. The familiar |Black Seeded Simpson' remains a popular heirloom variety of this type. Some looseleafs become handsome plants as large as 18 inches in diameter when grown in good soil. The color variation is great, ranging from bright green to deep red with shades of both in some types.

The looseleaf lettuce types are also commonly known as "cutting lettuces" or "cut-and-come-again" crops. They allow either individual plucking of the outer leaves or the cut-and-come-again cutting of the entire plant an inch above the crown. Such havesting is followed by regrowth of new leaves and is a fine way to obtain maximal cropping over a long period. The texture of the looseleafs is primarily crisp, although that may vary to a degree by the maturity of the greens at harvest time.

Romaine. The leaves of this lettuce are thick and grow upright. They are apt to mature a bit more slowly than the others. The most familiar and marketed strain of romaine is the |Parris Island,' which is a light green, but there are many other color variants, ranging from shades of green to deep red and purple. There are also dwarf romaines suitable for container culture and for raising in limited space. The leaves are often frilled and tender along the top edges, becoming increasingly crispy lower down on the stem.

LETTUCE CULTURE

Growing lettuce is not difficult. It is a wonderful vegetable to stimulate children's gardening interest and to satisfy the beginning gardener because growth is rapid and problems are few. The experienced gardener is equally rewarded by the variety of lettuces that never reach produce markets. It grows well in the early spring but successive plantings can ensure a supply well into the summer and again in the fall.

There are two ways to raise lettuce. Direct outdoor sowing is the simplest method. Cover the seeds with 1/4 inch of soil and keep them moist until growth is visible. Water the seedlings diligently thereafter if rain is lacking, because lettuce does poorly in dry weather.

Thin the plants 6 to 8 inches apart so that air circulates well around them, tossing the seedlings into a basket to mix in a salad with spring's first greens. If the foliage remains wet because of lack of thinning, the plants are susceptible to fungal diseases as well as damage by slugs.

Starting lettuce seedlings indoors and later transplanting them into the outdoor bed may be a better method for gardeners eager to harvest lettuce as soon as possible. Sow the seeds in plug trays to reduce root disturbance at transplant time. The plug method of growing eliminates the need later to thin the lettuce rows, if plants are properly spaced.

For a fall harvest, start the seed in a cool basement or air conditioned room, with temperatures in the low 70s, thus assuring germination. Once soil temperature reaches 80 degrees, outdoor sowing is unreliable, even with so-called "summer strains," because germination either will not occur or will be drastically reduced.

When setting out the transplants, consider interplanting some of the handsome red, green and curly-leafed varieties for a decorative touch in the vegetable garden. A few heads nestled into the flower beds may also liven up the perennial border until the flowers take over the show.