I’ve written a lot about growing your own lettuce right through the hottest months of the summer. Here’s a picture of a nice mix of salad greens that’s been grown in temperatures of 95+ for the last 3 weeks. If you do nothing to your lettuce in this weather two things will happen. First, it stops growing-almost in hibernation stage. Second, the plant will turn bitter. I’m working on my second ebook in which this will be the subject-how to grow great tasting lettuce in hot weather. It’s almost complete and should be around 20-25 pages in length. I’ve had great success doing this for many years using 4 or 5 techniques which I’ll be sharing. All with nice looking picture along the way. This thing about paying $2.50 or more for an organically grown head of lettuce doesn’t have to be. I’ll show you how to do it for pennies, and how to do it right through temperatures that otherwise make it virtually impossible to do so. It will be very cheap-$3.99. That’s a small price to pay to learn how to do it right. I’ve found some good practical advice on the internet about this, but I’ve been able to add 2 or 3 additional techniques that I do to make it even more likely that you’ll produce a non-bitter tasting head of lettuce during the summer months. I hope you’ll give it a look when it’s here.[ois skin=”below post”]
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Hi Jim – great article – look forward to your new ebook! Would love to see an ebook on your experiences with growing during the cold season e.g. with hoop houses, etc.
I’ve had a lot of experience with my hoops that you can see in previous posts from this past winter. Last year I didn’t stop gardening in the late fall or even winter-I went all the way through. I did a similar experiment a few years back to see if I could grow all year long and it worked-but it was only for a few squares that were protected with plastic. This past winter I had 8 boxes of gardens going all winter-and it was the coldest in over 50+ years. I knew it would work-or at least I thought it would, but this was a different kind of experiment. This time I grew crops that absolutely thrive in cool/cold weather and the results were truly amazing. I’ll be sharing more about that later. Right now I’m in the process of putting together a homemade greenhouse that I think I’ll be able to do for under $100. The whole idea is to be able to show folks how easy it is to grow your own food. The things that come out of my garden are absolutely wonderful. I grow veggies and produce for 5 people-it’s all I can do with my 148 square foot garden. I have 2 boxes for our family. But my customers are always begging me to extend the season because they can’t stand the taste of what they buy in the stores after getting fresh food. And it’s so easy. I had one customer call me in a panic a while back because her daughter was being unruly-she wanted some candy carrots which I didn’t deliver in my previous harvest basket. Stay tuned-I’ll be putting up some things about my new greenhouse. I don’t really need it because of the hoop house set up that you’ve seen. But I’m doing it so I can have a place to go in the winter and not get rained/snowed on when I’m working in the garden. The hoop houses are a little work-but it’s easy work. You’ve got to remove the weights holding down the plastic, uncover it, water, etc. And sometimes you’re out in bad weather. That won’t happen with this little greenhouse. It’s actually a larger hoop house….thanks for visiting…Jim
Awesome, looking forward to seeing the green house as well.