At a presentation I gave last year on growing greens I was asked how I managed succession planting for lettuce. My answer was “always have seedlings ready to plant”. To do that, I start lettuce seeds indoors every 3-4 weeks. It’s really simple, it just takes a little planning.
lettuce seedlings
Last week I started seeds for lettuce, radicchio, endive, arugula, pak choi, and tatsoi. When transplanted in the garden they will yield greens for salads and stir-fries in March and April. Next month I will sow more seeds, perhaps lettuce and komatsuna. As warm weather approaches I choose more heat-tolerant and bolt-resistant varieties. Having a continual supply of seedlings means I always have something ready to replace the things I harvest.
For starting most small seeds like lettuce, broccoli, tomato, basil etc I like to use the 200-cell plug flat below. After germination I’ll thin to one seedling per cell, and when the seedlings are ready for planting or transplanting I just use my little transplant tool and plop them right out of the cells. That way the roots are undisturbed, and it saves me a lot of time when dealing with large numbers of seedlings.
200 cell plug flat
I got these plug flats from Johnny’s Selected Seeds, and they also come in different sized cells for larger seeds and transplants. Still, I find I use this size the most for vegetables, flowers and herbs. Each cell is slightly less than 1 inch square (20mm) and is 1.5 inches deep.
And even though it has 200 cells you don’t have to use them all. Many times I use less, and since it is the size of a standard flat it doesn’t take up a lot of room under the fluorescent lights.
I do find it helps to keep a garden log to help with the planning. I use an Excel spreadsheet – nothing fancy, just one line per variety (or event), with dates and notes. I may miss a few entries occasionally, but for the most part I do my best to document what’s going on.
It takes a leap of faith to be planting salad greens when there’s 6 inches of snow on the ground, but that a big part of gardening, isn’t it?
Faith and experience may be two sides of the same coin in this case, as we remember spring salads past.
200 cells don’t sound like they could fit in a standard flat. But I do like the idea of not disturbing anybody’s roots when it comes time to transplant… of course I will do my best, but sometimes it can’t be helped when they are growing in one open flat.
Your seedlings look so healthy!
You’re quite a bit ahead of my planting schedule. I’ll not seed my first lettuce until the second week of March, for early May salads. I’m hoping to take a pot or two of the AZ lettuce home with me for earlier salads.
I sowed my first lettuce of the season yesterday. I usually sow them in a gutter, and have often wondered about using a plug flat, maybe I will check out the prices here in the UK
It is a leap of faith to be sowing so early … but wont it be nice to be eating homegrown salad early!
K