Your main tending tasks when growing lettuce will be thinning, watering, pruning, and using covers to extend your season.
You might be thinking What about fertilizing? Growing your lettuce plants in great, nutrient-rich soil is often enough to get them through their entire lifecycle in your garden. If you ever feel like your plants could use more nutrients, add some compost. Compost is really my go-to fertilizer. Itll help your plants grow healthy and strong in the most natural way possible.
It might seem hard to believe, but you can begin cutting tons of delicious lettuce leaves within a month.
The best time of day to harvest from your lettuce plants is early in the morning. Lettuce plants are at their sweetest after a full night of sleep. One of my favorite rituals is having a cup of coffee and then heading out to the garden with my salad spinner to do a little bit of cutting before the kids wake up.
Remember, leaves are edible at each stage of growth. You can eat the leaves when they are “baby leaf” size, or you can wait until they grow bigger. Smaller leaves are going to be sweeter and softer, while larger leaves are often crunchier.
How Far Apart to Plant Lettuce in a Raised Bed for Optimal Growth
Growing lush, healthy lettuce is a joy for any gardener. And raised beds offer key advantages for lettuce cultivation. Their loose, fertile soil, drainage, and warmth help lettuce thrive. But to maximize yields in this prime space, proper planting technique is essential. Getting the spacing right allows your lettuce to fully flourish. This guide covers everything you need to know about optimal lettuce spacing in raised beds.
Why Lettuce Loves Raised Beds
Lettuce is well-suited to raised bed growing for several reasons:
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Better drainage and aeration – Raised beds promote drainage and air circulation around roots, preventing soggy soil. Lettuce hates “wet feet”.
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Warmer spring soil temps – The loose soil in raised beds warms up quicker in spring, accelerating growth.
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Precision fertilization – It’s easier to enrich soil with compost and organic matter in a contained bed.
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Pest protection – Covers and netting can be installed over beds, safeguarding lettuce.
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Easy harvesting – Waist-high beds make picking lettuce a cinch. No sore backs!
In short, raised beds give lettuce an advantage right from the start. Now let’s look at how best to arrange them in this prime real estate.
Spacing Guidelines for Lettuce Varieties
Not all lettuces are created equal when it comes to spacing needs. Here are recommended ranges:
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Looseleaf – 6-8 inches apart. Quick-growing types like oakleaf.
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Butterhead – 10-12 inches apart. Boston, bibb. Lovely but loose heads.
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Romaine – 10-12 inches apart. Upright, robust leaves make full heads.
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Summer Crisp – 12-14 inches. Heat-loving varieties like Batavia.
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Iceberg – 14-18 inches. The big kahuna of lettuces needs room.
Check your seed packet too, as spacing may vary slightly between varieties. Give your lettuce the space it craves.
Arranging Lettuce – Rows Versus Blocks
Lettuce can be oriented in rows or blocks:
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Rows – Standard rows spaced according to variety size. Offers aisles for access.
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Blocks – Grid pattern without open rows. Maximizes planting density.
Both work well. Match the layout to your raised bed dimensions and access needs. Just don’t cram plants too tight. Air circulation suffers.
The Importance of Thinning Young Lettuce
Lettuce can be densely seeded at first. But thinning is vital:
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Identify final spacing for variety when plants have 3-4 true leaves.
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Gradually thin over 2-3 weeks, clipping with scissors at soil level.
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Take care not to disturb remaining seedling roots.
Thinning reduces competition between plants for light, water and nutrition. It results in fewer but much larger, robust lettuce plants. Don’t skip this step!
Interplanting Lettuce Among Other Crops
In addition to monoculture blocks, lettuce can be interplanted:
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Quick-growing lettuce fits between slower crops, like broccoli or carrots.
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Short lettuce won’t overshadow tall crops like tomatoes or trellised cucumbers.
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Radishes mark rows, maturing before lettuce needs the space.
Interplanting boosts productivity in limited raised bed space. But avoid shading lettuce with aggressive companions.
Growing Lettuce in Containers
Lettuce also readily adapts to containers:
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Use at least a 12-16 inch pot for one lettuce plant.
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For multiple plants, a 20 inch wide planter is a good starting point.
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Match lettuce spacing to container dimensions.
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Ensure at least 6 inches of soil depth.
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Site containers in full sun and water consistently.
With good light and moisture, container-grown lettuce will thrive!
Planting Density Impacts on Growth
Lettuce density also affects growth:
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Sparse planting means faster growth and bigger individual plants but lower total yield.
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Dense planting leads to slower growth and smaller plants but higher overall yield.
Experiment to see what spacing works best for your climate and season. Just avoid overcrowded, stressed plants.
The Takeaway – Lettuce Loves Room
When cultivating lettuce in raised beds, proper spacing is crucial. Match lettuce varieties’ spacing needs, use thinning to your advantage, and experiment with density. Soon you’ll be harvesting bountiful, beautiful lettuce from your optimized raised beds. The right spacing makes all the difference for success!
Plant Lettuce from Seed
Although you may see lettuces sold as starts at your local nursery or garden center, you likely wont have much luck successfully transplanting them into your salad garden. Even if they survive, you wont see as much growth as you will from the ones you plant directly by seed into your garden.
Plus, lettuce plants grow so quickly that it just makes sense to save your money and only buy plant starts for something that will take longer to reach maturity and spend a longer time in your garden.
2 Different Ways to Sow Lettuce Seeds
You can follow the spacing guidelines I detailed above (planting strategically), or you can basically scatter your lettuce seeds and plant them densely. Again, the more densely you plant them, the more frequently youll need to trim them and harvest.
I recommend not wearing gardening gloves when planting since lettuce seeds are so tiny. Theyre much easier to handle with bare hands, so get ready to get your hands a little dirty!
Lets look at each method in more detail.
How to Grow Lettuce // Seed to Harvest // Complete Growing Guide
FAQ
How far apart do you plant lettuce in raised beds?
This nutritious, leafy green is a great option for in-ground gardening, raised garden beds, and containers. Space lettuce plants 6 to 18 inches apart (depending on the variety) in an area that gets an abundance of sun and has fertile, well-drained soil with a pH between 6.0 and 7.0.
What happens if you plant lettuce too close together?
Their seeds are small, so they don’t need to be planted very deep, only about 1/4 inch. Since you’ll be thinning the lettuce plants later, you don’t need to worry about planting them too close. It’s ideal to plant them close together so you can thin and enjoy baby lettuce as they grow!
What is the best spacing for lettuce plants?
Regardless of the row width, the in-row spacing between each head lettuce plant should be 12 inches. If 42-inch rows are used, yield can be increased by planting 2 seed rows per bed. Leaf and butterhead types should be grown in double rows 12 inches apart and 8 to 10 inches in row spacing.
What is the easiest lettuce to grow in a raised bed?
For the beginner gardener, loose-leaf, baby-leaf, and mini-head lettuces, as they’re most often labeled in seed catalogs, are the easiest varieties to start with — they’re simpler, faster to grow, and milder than full-size head lettuce.
How far apart should lettuce be planted?
As a basic guideline, lettuce should be spaced 20cm to 25cm (8-10 inches) apart. However, this spacing can vary depending on the variety you are growing: Heading lettuce, such as iceberg, should have 25cm to 30cm (10-12 inches) between the mature plants. This also includes other varieties that have large round heads, which require a lot of space.
How many rows of lettuce should be planted in a raised bed?
For cultivating lettuce, Coleman generally suggests a 42 inch strip that contains a 12 inch path and 3 rows of lettuce in the remaining 30 inches. Check out this video for a visual of Elliot Coleman’s growing method. When growing lettuce in a raised bed, the plant spacing is generally the same as in garden.
How wide should a lettuce plant be?
We find that about 30cm (12 inches) is an ideal width for the lettuce in our garden, as it allows us to walk between the rows while maximizing the growing capacity of the plot. Depending on your garden plant, and whether you walk between rows or not. Many of us plant our gardens in nice, long rows.
How do you plant lettuce in a garden?
In addition to planting lettuce in solid blocks or rows, I also tuck it between and around other vegetables. Its quick growth suits interplanting. Some combinations that work well: Radishes mixed with lettuce help mark lettuce rows. Lettuce underplanted between wide rows of broccoli or cauliflower. Mixed baby greens sown between carrots.
How much lettuce should you plant per square foot?
This is the idea of dividing your garden into small squares and planting your vegetables in a grid. In square-foot gardening, you still want to ensure that your lettuce has enough space. While a single square foot might contain 30 carrot seeds, you should only plant 4 leaf lettuce and 1 head lettuce per square foot.
How to grow lettuce in raised beds?
Purchase a soil test kit from your local garden center to check the pH level. If necessary, you can amend the soil with lime to raise the pH or sulfur to lower it. There are two main ways to cultivate lettuce in raised beds: sowing seeds directly or transplanting seedlings. Sowing Seeds: