Lettuce

Abiqua said:

On Dr Dukes page...

http://www.ars-grin.gov/duke/

Look for this link...4th down under Plant Searches

or paste this
http://sun.ars-grin.gov:8080/npgspub/xsql/duke/listsp.xsql

and type dandelion....
[This will give you what I attached a pdf of..]
A pretty thorough mineral analysis of dandelion done in ppm....Little reminder 10,000ppm equals 1% concentration and 100,000 is 10% so forth..just handy to be reminded when reading these sheets, because there is a LOT!

Another note right at top is this little link easy to miss....



Using this database, they seemingly have thousands of plants with the same type of entries...I rarely cannot find a plant on this database....

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I checked it out a little and saw some good things like they're high in calcium, but I don't know what half of that stuff is. Do you see high amounts of anything bad? What is your opinion about fermenting dandelion plants including flowers? What I'm thinking is ferment it and then add a teaspoon or so to a 5 gallon bucket of aerated water, let it bubble overnight and water the plants with it. I have a cheap PPM meter.

Dave's Not Here said:

I checked it out a little and saw some good things like they're high in calcium, but I don't know what half of that stuff is. Do you see high amounts of anything bad? What is your opinion about fermenting dandelion plants including flowers? What I'm thinking is ferment it and then add a teaspoon or so to a 5 gallon bucket of aerated water, let it bubble overnight and water the plants with it. I have a cheap PPM meter.

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Nah, nothing is "bad"....high amounts of calcium, which is the Albrecht school of soil....high silica/Ca ......


I have two ideas for you....

One is to soak them in water....just submerge enough to be covered....also you can just USE A Rubber Glove for the LID....as it expands, you will know it is starting to ferment... [forgot that one]

The other idea is to put them into a flat plastic container with all dry material....and then just seal for a couple of weeks....take it out, should smell almost like pickles...dry it, chop it up and add it to dry soil mix....


Also can add homemade Lactic Acid Bacteria [LAB] solution...to help results...but honestly isn't needed....

Abiqua said:

Nah, nothing is "bad"....high amounts of calcium, which is the Albrecht school of soil....high silica/Ca ......


I have two ideas for you....

One is to soak them in water....just submerge enough to be covered....also you can just USE A Rubber Glove for the LID....as it expands, you will know it is starting to ferment... [forgot that one]

The other idea is to put them into a flat plastic container with all dry material....and then just seal for a couple of weeks....take it out, should smell almost like pickles...dry it, chop it up and add it to dry soil mix....


Also can add homemade Lactic Acid Bacteria [LAB] solution...to help results...but honestly isn't needed....

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Thanks man, I'm going to try #1 but I might try #2 as well, I have plenty of dandelions, they're everywhere! I started a small patch of alfalfa to try some stuff like this too. I burnt some wood and brush today to get some wood ashes for some garden spots.

Our early summer has reverted back to more normal early spring like weather for the moment and the temps are really dipping at night, mid 30's last night, but next week I'll probably be setting some tomatoes out and putting buckets over them on colder nights. They're starting to get up into the light! Another tray of peppers in front, since I killed half of the first tray I did.



.

I just can't grow hydro lettuce....

willienelson1stgrow said:

I just can't grow hydro lettuce....

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I doubt if I could either! I do have a lot of little lettuce plants outside right now, ate a few leaves off the arugula plants... Can't wait to start harvesting some greens, it seems like everything is late this year, long winter.

Earlier with dinner I had my first big salad of the season and might not get many more the way it's heating up around here, straight from winter to summer, hardly any cool season this year.

But it was great, several kinds of lettuce, green onion, a little arugula, baby pak choi, mustard greens, and spinach. I love the cool season big salads as much as the hot season tomatoes and peppers. It has been in the 80's and 90's though and any day my lettuce could say fuck you and start tasting awful.

It has been growing fast in the heat though and I've been watering it a few times a day. The pak choi and arugula are already bolting but still taste great, I've been chopping off the tall bolting stalks on a lot of it hoping to keep it going longer.

I've noticed that different types of lettuce germinate at different temperatures, Black Seeded Simpson and Green Oak Leaf lettuce seemed to be the earliest in the cool weather. I have an heirloom mix that I really like and it didn't even start to germinate until it got about 70 degrees out.

I always let some of the bolted lettuce live and go to seed and save it, so I don't have to buy it. I'll be saving a lot of this heirloom mix this year, I really like the light green red speckled variety, I want big plots of it.

Also I don't plant lettuce and greens in rows usually, I plant 3-4ft wide patches of it usually. When I first tried growing lettuce I tried doing it in rows and it was really disappointing and seemed like a big waste of space, then I started planting in patches and seeding them pretty heavily and started getting lots of lettuce.. I don't really do much of anything in rows, I have a bunch of small patches, when a plant drops its seed it doesn't drop them in rows.

Anyways, I'm rambling , love the lettuce.

just had a caesar salad pulled straight from my garden, planted march 17th.

Looking forward to trying some of our home grown lettuce soon>

grown with recylced soil from the mj grow. The lettuce seem to like it.
Peace, DST

DST said:

Looking forward to trying some of our home grown lettuce soon>

grown with recylced soil from the mj grow. The lettuce seem to like it.
Peace, DST

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Tasty looking plants, the ones I picked on today were smaller than yours and I harvested a couple whole plants about the size of the one on the bottom left.

I've got a load in the greenhouse as well, but these ones outdoors are a little bit ahead. Does get a tad warmer in the greenhouse. These are what we call Kropsla in Holland, which literally translates to lettuce, lol. I grew some icebreg last year, blushed butterhead and a couple others but unfortunately we got overrun with ants and aphids....was soul destroying throwing away all that green goodness, over 50% went into the bin. Gone to town on the ants this year so fingers crossed. Happy growing! DST

DST said:

I've got a load in the greenhouse as well, but these ones outdoors are a little bit ahead. Does get a tad warmer in the greenhouse. These are what we call Kropsla in Holland, which literally translates to lettuce, lol. I grew some icebreg last year, blushed butterhead and a couple others but unfortunately we got overrun with ants and aphids....was soul destroying throwing away all that green goodness, over 50% went into the bin. Gone to town on the ants this year so fingers crossed. Happy growing! DST

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I never have many bug problems this time of year, but late in the summer/fall they'll take over a few things and usually eat on the lettuce if I have a fall crop. I can't grow a head of iceberg lettuce for anything, maybe if I started them indoors really early.

It rained last night and the early heat wave broke today, 70's F in the day today and rainy, perfect lettuce weather now.

Here are some Oak Leaf lettuce and some baby Romaines I took a pic of today before it started raining again.

This is what I have so far. Do you guys like my idea of using these plastic 20 oz bottle containers for little beds? It allows me to put them inside on cold nights

resinhead said:

This is what I have so far. Do you guys like my idea of using these plastic 20 oz bottle containers for little beds? It allows me to put them inside on cold nightsView attachment 3423852

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I like your little homemade bed there, but I have qualms about plastic breaking down into my soil and then into my food over time, I'm sure it will probably be fine for one season though. Lettuce can handle a little cold and usually a light frost no problem, I once had some oak leaf lettuce survive through a mild winter when it only got down to about 15 degrees F. The leaves died back but as soon as it warmed up it started growing again.

Dave's Not Here said:

I like your little homemade bed there, but I have qualms about plastic breaking down into my soil and then into my food over time, I'm sure it will probably be fine for one season though. Lettuce can handle a little cold and usually a light frost no problem, I once had some oak leaf lettuce survive through a mild winter when it only got down to about 15 degrees F. The leaves died back but as soon as it warmed up it started growing again.

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I never thought about that with the plastic! Come to think of it, the felt I lined it with is recycled material... Probably more plastic!

resinhead said:

I never thought about that with the plastic! Come to think of it, the felt I lined it with is recycled material... Probably more plastic!

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I think you'll be fine for the season, I just wouldn't use the plastic again next year.

My partial bed of lettuce today, I'll probably be harvesting this soon to make room for peppers.

More lettuce...

Some lettuce and some bolting Pak Choi in the front, I really like the heirloom lettuce that's still small in the back, it didn't sprout as easily or as quickly as the salad bowl lettuce in front of it though.



Here's a small patch, I think this is Slobolt lettuce...



More salad bowl lettuce, some peas, a flowering kale and some of those groundhog radishes I'm letting bolt for seed.


I've got some more lettuce but those are my main patches of it this year.

Here's some arugula flowering...

Looking good DNH!

Lots of salads in your future. I like arugula but since I like lots of spicy salad materials, I find it can overpower my green leaf and butter lettuces.

We have had about ten big salads so far! It seems to grow back better each time I cut them!

resinhead said:

We have had about ten big salads so far! It seems to grow back better each time I cut them!

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Looks good man, all my lettuce has bolted at this point. I want to try growing some indoors so I can have it year round, a couple trays like yours going all the time would be great.