Eat , Sleep ...

[Terry Coombs]

and be merry , for tomorrow we plant . We have seeds , and we know how to use them ! . I have my 1st starter tray ready to go , tomorrow I plant onions and lettuce . I've always had a problem with lettuce bolting , so this year I'll be planting it indoors and setting it out as soon as last frost danger has passed . Onions , well , in the past I've used the white onion bulbs from WM . This year our green onions will come from seed . I found an ebay seller that seems pretty good , 1lucky1972 , he says all his seeds are heirloom and he/she? has a pretty good selection . We'll see !

[Ecnerwal]

Could be you set it out (or simply planted seed) too late. Lettuce can take some frost, and the seeds for direct seeded should definitely be out there well before last frost. Two years ago when I tried doing lots of things in soil blocks, the lettuce stated nicely in them and transplanted nicely with them (as expected, it's evidently a common commercial technique) but did not maintain an advantage over direct-seeded lettuce as the season went on.

Early lettuce also works well with some minor coverage (row cover, cold frame or the like.) Mind you, I have no great success with the stuff (I like head lettuce, I can't grow it for the life of me, even though people supposedly farm the stuff more-or-less in the same climate and I've tried selections that are supposed to work around here.)

I can get leaf lettuce somewhat, but it's never a very satisfying use of time and garden space. Often it feels like a food patch for slugs, and then you have incidents like the deer hoof that managed to take out half a row of tiny lettuce just by stomping on it and I start to feel that the stuff is cursed...