7-HACKS – Growing Lettuce From Seeds! (IN POTS)
Growing Lettuce At Home, From Seeds Is Super Easy. All You Need To do is Just Follow This Post Very carefully. Here We Will See How To grow Lettuce From Seeds, With All The Step By Step Details & Updates.
Origin & Basics of Lettuce Plant….
Lettuce is a Hardy & an Easy To Grow Annual Vegetable Plant. That Likes a Cool Area to Grow. If You are Just Starting With Vegetables. Its The Best Choice For You. Lettuce Plants Have many Varieties, Like Iceberg, Romine Etc All Have Specific appearence. This is The Most Common Green Lettuce, That can Be Grown Indoors As well As Outdoors.
Basically Lettuce is Native To Mediteranean Regions & Used As a Salad Worldwide. The Impressive Thing about Lettuce, is that They Will Be Ready To Harvest Within a month Or so, Their Fertilization Requirement is also Less, So Overall Its Best For Beginners, So Must Give It a Try.
What is the Best Time to Grow Lettuce from seeds?
The First & The Most Important Thing to Grow lettuce from Seeds Is Understanding The Right Season To Sow Their Seeds. Basically, Lettuce Plants Likes a Cool Area To Grow, So The Best Time To Grow them Would Be Right Before The Winters, as They Grow Quickly, You Can Also Grow Them in a Coolder region, All Over The Year, But The Best Time Would Be Springs Or Early Winter.
1-Choosing Best Seeds….
The Next Most Important Thing To Grow Lettuce From Seeds is Choosing The Good Quality, Fresh Seeds. Also Make Sure to Choose The Right Type of Variety For Your Area, Some Local varietes Grow Very Healthily, Dont Try To Grow Some rare varietes Specially If You are Just Starting With Lettuce Plants.
Also make Sure the Seeds are Fresh, Older Seeds have Lesser Germination Rate, & The Plants Will Be Weaker As Well. You Can Also Browse some Of The Good Quality Lettuce Seeds linked Here, They all Are Good Quality.
2-Preparing Soil media & Pot!
About The Soil mix, a Well Draining & Loose Soil Mix Is Best To Grow Lettuce Seeds, Hard & Compact Mixture Can Be A Hardle For Better Seeds Germination, So You can Also Make a Good Seeds Starter At Home, Follow The Guide Linked Here. For The Pot, Any 3 To 5 Inches Pot is Good, Make Sure It Have a Few Drainage Holes.
3-Sowing Lettuce Seeds….
For Sowing Lettuce Seeds, Water The Soil First. As They are small In Size So be careful. Make Sure To Place Them Evenly With Proper Distancing. Dont Sow To Many Seeds, Just As Much The pot have the Place Of.
Cover Them With a Fine Layer of Same Seeds Starter, Or Cocopeat. Mist Some Moisture Over The Soil Surface, Using a Gentle Spray. Dont Through Water Over The Soil mix.
Now Place This Pot In a Very Well Lit Area, Not In The Sun & Not in The Shade. Just a Semi Shaded Area Works Very Well.
4-After 4 days(Sunlight)…
Within a Few days, The Tiny Seedlings Of Lettuce Plants Will Poop Out. At This Stage a Good Lit Area Is Very Important, Otherwise They Get Leggy & Die.
With a Few More days, The Seedlings Will Be On their Own Feet. At This Stage, Water Very Gentle, try To Use a Spray Bottle.
5-After 17 days(Transplant)….
Within a few more Days, The Lettuce seedlings Will be Ready To Transplant & Will Have a Few true Leaves. You Can Transplant them when they are at least 15 to 20 days old.
Gentle Get The Seedlings Out Of The Pot. & Transplant Them in a Wider Pot, That have Atleast a Few Inches Of Depth. For Single Lettuce Plant a 5 to 6 inches Pot, Is Enough.
I am Using These Wider Grow Bags, The Have Excellet Drainage System. You Can Also Buy Them From This Link. For Soil, i am Using a Loose & Well Draining Soil mix, You can also Buy a Good Mixture From This link. Carefully put The Seedlings In The Soil & Cover The Seedling Upto This Area, Where The Crown Starts.
This Way Transplant all The Lettuce seedlings, Remember To Leave Enough Space between Plants, So They can Grow Healthily. Water Them Frequently, & Place This Pot in a Semi Shaded Area, Away From Direct Sunlight, For a few days.
After 22 Days…
Within a Few More Days, You will See Your Lettuce Plants Will Be Healthy & Growing Again. Now You Can Give Them a Ful Sun area, Or Atleast Make Sure they Recieve 2 To 3 Hours of Direct Sunlight.
After 27 Days….
Deficiency Of Sun Can Appear In The Form of a Leggy & Dull Growth, Also Leaf Color Will Be Like Parrot Or Yellowish. So Make Sure they have a Sunny Spot.
6-After 33 days(Fertilizer)….
With a Few More Days, The Lettuce Plants Will Be Growing, At This Stage You can Fertilize Them Using a Nitrogen Enrich fertilizer. The Best Option Would Be This Homemade Organic fertilizer, That I Have Made Specially For Vegetables, Using Very Simple Ingredients.
Complete Guide On This is Added Here, Must Check It Out. & Fertilize Your Plants Every 10 Days, But I am Not Going To fertilize Them, At This Stage, as I have already Included some Compost In The Soil mix While The Transplant.
7-After 47 Days(Harvesting)…
So Here We Have The Final, Lish green & Healthy Look of These Lettuce Plants. Now They are Ready To Harvest. If You Leave Them, The Better Taste Of Lettuce Leaves Will Be Lost. So Try To Harvest Them When The Leaves are younger.
Simply Use a Clean Cutter & Cut Right Above The Crown Of The Plant. This is the Crowm, From where The New Leaves, Grow.
This way Harvest all The Lettuce Leaves. So Here we have The Final Harvest of Lettuce Plants. You Can Easily Use Them as a Salad Or Cooking Etc. At a Cool area, You can also Store Them upto a week or so.
For These Plants, I Will fertilize Them Using The Same fertilizer & Leave Them For Growing Again. They Will be Ready within 10 to 12 days For harvesting The Leaves again. This way You Can get upto 3 to 4 Harvests.
Common Problems!
Now lets Talk a Little About, What Type of problems You could Of Be Encuntered With, While Growing Lettuce. As general, Lettuce Plants dont Have So many Issues, but For The pest, Aphids, Snails & Slugs Can appear, As a Prevention You Can Use Neem Oil Spray, That is also Added Here, To buy.
Sometimes, Pests attack Can be Really Disturbing thing For all Type of Vegetables. So For their 100% Removal From Your Whole Garden, i have made an E book, That You can Follow & Say Good Bye To all Type of pests Over Your Whole Vegetable Garden. Its Linked Here. Must Give it a Try.
So its all About Growing Lettuce From Seeds. To Learn More About Lettuce & Other Type of Vegetables, Here is the Link to hundred Of Resources.