You haves seen me experimenting with growing roots on vegetables. Well one turned into a head of lettuce.
When the one on the left got so big that it sprouted a second story, I decided it is time to take all the big leaves off and make a fresh snack! It tasted better than anything I had ever bought.
I started with a full head of lettuce that I got at the veggie-mart. I pulled back all the leaves and trimmed them away from the little white ones in the center. Then I trimmed off a piece of the stalk, just an eighth inch, and put some rooting hormone on the fresh stalk.
I placed it in a pot meant for indoors. At the time, it was in the forties outside and I wanted this to grow more quickly. I set it in the greenhouse with my carnivorous plants and gave it water with fertilizer from my garden.
It grew into what you see above on the left. It then provided the bowl of salad and is growing again in the same pot. I am not sure how large this will get in its third growing cycle, but it is pictured below, ten days later. (today)
I also started two others since then. and I am keeping these in the greenhouse. The nice part about food that grows inside like a houseplant is that they have no pesticides on them. If you wanted to try this, you could. All you need is a window that has sunlight (works with indirect sun as well).
Here is the recooperating lettuce head, and the two new ones that will be lunch around the fifteenth of September. I am not sure how many times you can take them down to the center leaves or how many times they will grow another lunch for you. This is all experimental.
If the weather warms up, these will go outside. I know they have roots because I can't pull them up but when I transplant them, I will write something about how big the roots got.
I also have about ten lettuce plant that are growing from seeds outside. It will be along time until those can be eaten.
Here is a the smallest (with a toothpick for scale) and the largest of the seedlings (with an egg for scale). The seeds were germinated on the first of August.
Thanks for stopping in. This post shows the process for planting a cabbage with rooting hormone if you want to try it.
