Urban Gardening - How to Grow Lettuce

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Leaf Lettuce

One of the plant in our mini-urban garden is the lettuce.

There are different types or classification of lettuce: leaf, cos or romaine, crisphead, butterhead, and stem.

Leaf lettuce or also called loose-leaf lettuce has a loosely arranged leaves in stalk while the cos or romaine lettuce forms an upright and elongated head.

Butterhead varieties are small, loose-heading types with tender, soft and buttery-textured leaves exhibiting a mild, sweet, and succulent taste.

Crisphead lettuce or iceberg lettuce are round, compact with overlapping leaves. The outer leaves are greener compared to the inner leaves.  It is denser compared to butterhead lettuce. 

Stem lettuce are grown mainly for their thick stems and widely used in stews and creamy Chinese dishes. These variety are also called celtuce, asparagus lettuce, or celery lettuce.

Lettuce is a good source of nutrients like Vitamin K, Vitamin A, folate, and iron.

Is it difficult to grow lettuce?

Let me share with you how I grow a leaf lettuce in our garden.

At first, I tried growing lettuce from the stalk.

Growing lettuce from stalk

After a few days, new leaves started to grow but after a week, the stalk became rotten. With this, I decided to grow lettuce from seeds. I bought a pack of seeds from the supermarket.

Since lettuce seeds are tiny, I planted lettuce through indirect seeding. Instead of a seedbox, I used small pots as their temporary growing media.

The seeds are sprinkled over the soil, cover it with a thin layer of garden soil, then water with slow stream ensuring that the seeds do not wash away.

Lettuce Seedlings

Maintain moisture of the water by misting the seedbox with water daily. Germination of seeds will take from 7 to 20 days.

While waiting for the seeds to germinate and ready for transplanting, find for a place where the plants will get enough sunlight for at least 4 to 6 hours. It does not need to be in direct sunlight.

Next is the time to make your hands dirty. Prepare the soil where you are going to transfer the seedlings. I used ordinary soil mixed with sawdust. This will make your growing media moist all the time.

Soil mixed with sawdust

Preparing the soil one week before transplanting is recommended.

Once the seedlings have already developed 4 to 6 leaves, they are ready to be transplanted.

Transplanted lettuce seedlings

Dig holes of about 1 to 2 inches deep on the soil with about 4 to 6 inches apart. Transfer the lettuce seedlings in each hole. Having this spacing, when the leaves are fully grown, will cover the soil making the water retention longer.

Press the soil around the seedlings and water gently.

After several days, the leaves will start and continue to grow.

7 days

14 days

One of the important thing in planting lettuce is water. Keeping the soil moist especially during hot weather is good for the plant. Since I am doing my urban gardening at the rooftop, I am planning to install water hose reels or backyard hose reels like the ones found on EleyHoseReels.com for easy watering job.

 Mulching the soil with sawdust or rice hull will also help retain water.

21 days

30 days

And after about 45 days, the lettuce is ready to harvest. 

45 days

Harvesting can be done by pruning the matured leaves and saving the stalk and let it grow continuously.

First Harvest

After two weeks, another set of leaves can be harvested from the same stalk.

2 weeks after the pruning the leaves

Lettuce is disease and pest free plant but aphids, slugs, snails, and caterpillars love lettuce. Homemade insecticide can help control insects. Putting dry ash around the plant will help inhibit snail attacks.

Another condition that lettuce may encounter is tipburn. This is where the leaves started to brown and curl due to inconsistent moisture. To save the plant from tipburn, remove the browned leaves, and start watering consistently.

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Urban Gardening: Batch 2 Updates

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Just before the community quarantine was implemented, I already have a small vegetable garden at home. I also keep sharing ideas on how I cultivate some of the vegetables like lettuce, sitaw, eggplant, and others.

Just to share a short update. My vegetable garden is already on its second batch except for eggplants.

My lettuce is still in its germination stage that after a couple of weeks, I will be transferring them.

The sitaws in pots were already climb up to the end of the pole.

They are already in its flowering stage and after 7-10 days I will start harvesting.

There are also ginger in the plant bed.

I have difficulties in growing bell peppers and this time, I tried placing them inside a mosquito net to prevent from direct sunlight. Also, September-January is the best time to plant peppers according to Department of Agriculture's Plant Calendar.

Kangkong and kamote are still growing, which I already harvested some last Saturday for our breakfast.

Kangkong

Kamote

The calamansi is already bearing fruits while the lemons are starting to bloom.

The cucumbers planted in an old tire are climbing so fast that I need to make their trellis.

By the way, they are starting to flower and bear fruits.

Just like the cucumbers, the ampalaya is also climbing up its trellis.

After several tries of sowing seeds, the orka in pots is finally matured and heatlhy. Soon, it will show its flowers and develop into a fruit.

I also tried growing grapes this time and hopefully a success.

I also did some experiments in propagating indoor plants using recycled jars and bottles.

That’s all for now in my urban garden.

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Urban Gardening: How To Grow Okra In Pots

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One of the veggies I planted in my small urban garden is the okra or known as Ladyfingers. 

Okra grows commonly in warm countries. Some propagate it as an ornamental plant because it blooms like a gumamela.

Many don’t like to eat okra because it secrets a slimy juice but okra is good for weight loss since it has a low calorie ( about 25 to 40 kcal per 100 grams). Okra is also rich in vitamins A and C, minerals like phosphorus and calcium.

How did I grow in pots?

I used a pot that is 10-12 inches deep with a planting media consist of rice hulls and loam soil. This soil mixture is well-drained and rich in organic matter. You can also use animal manure. The pot should be placed where there is enough sunlight. Okra should receive at least 5 hours of full sunlight.

Since okra seeds are considered large, it can be planted directly in the pot or so-called direct seeding.

At about ½-1 inch deep, sow 2-3 okra seeds with about 6 inches apart. Water the seeds and keep the soil moist while waiting for the seeds to germinate. Patience is needs in waiting for the sprout to emerge from the soil which is usually 5-10 days.

After 2-3 weeks from seed’s germination, the leaves will continue to grown with large leaves. Since I planted okra in a pot or pail, I used the small variety can grown up to 3 feet only.

After another couple of weeks an flowers will start to emerge on the top most part of the plant. It looks like the okra pod.

After 3-5 days, it will open into light yellow petals as the first flower. Okra are self-pollinating, so you don't have to worry if the flower develop into a fruit.

The okra fruit starts to appear 5-7days after blooming and should be harvested until still tender. 

You can tell if the fruit is still tender by bending the tip and breaks easily.

Okra can be easily damaged by fusarium wilt caused by fungi. Also, it is susceptible to whiteflies and aphids. Fungi can be managed by applying fungicide on soil white the insects can be controlled by homemade insecticides.

Happy Gardening!

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Urban Gardening: How To Grow Sitaw In Pots

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It’s been a while since I posted about our vegetable garden at home. What about you? How is your garden?

The rainy season is already on its way, and this is the best time to grow pole beans or commonly known to as sitaw. Although the sitaw can be planted at any time of the year, it has higher productivity when grown during May and in October-November.

Sitaw is a good source of protein, vitamins, and minerals like Vitamin C, folate, magnesium, and manganese.

For home garden or urban planting, sowing sitaw is easy. It can survive using almost any type of soil.

Location is not a problem since the sitaw can flourish under full sunlight but can also survive under partial shade.

How I grow my sitaw?

Sitaw seeds are large enough to have direct seeding method. Sow the seeds at a depth of 2-3cm with about 6-8 inches apart. If you are using pots or recycled pails, you can decrease the distance between seeds. I used to plant 6-8 seeds per pot.

Sitaw started to emege from the soil.

After 3-4 days, seeds will sprout out of the soil.  

The leaves is already coming out.

Once it started to emerged from the soil, sitaw grows fast.

The first pair of leaves.

 And after 2 days, the first pair of leaves will appear.

In about 2 weeks after planting, the sitaw will need support to cling on as it grows. Place pole beside each plant. I used small bamboo branches here.

Trellis are already placed for the sitaw to climb.

Flowers will start to emerge and a small pod will start to appear as the flower wilts. 

Sitaw flowers

Enough water supply is needed to increase the production of flower pod production.

Sitaw pods

After 7-10 days, the sitaw is ready for harvest by holding the stem and twisting the pod until it snaps off. Once picking of pods started, it can be made with 2-3 days interval.

Like most vegetables, the sitaw is also prone to pests and diseases.

Aphids damaging the leaves and flowers.

Common pests are beanfly, aphids, pod borer, leafminer, and leafhopper. Using homemade insecticide is good enough to control these pests.

Mosaic virus is one of the common diseases of the sitaw. This is a virus carried by aphids resulting in irregularly-shaped light green leaves.

Another is rust. The first stage of this disease is white spots on the underside of the leaves. The entire leaf will turn yellow and after few days dried up then falls off.

Root rot is also a common problem in growing sitaw. This is caused by a fungus that grows after prolonged rain or excessive water.

One of the most effective control in pest and disease prevention of sitaw is using more resistant varieties, crop rotation, pruning of infected parts, and if needed, using chemicals like fungicides.

Adobong Sitaw

Here are some of the sitaw harvested from our home vegetable garden cooked straight in the kitchen.

Happy gardening!

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