Growing lettuce
Growing a salad in your garden is easy. It takes root well in light, fertile soil with the addition of rotted cow dung. The salad is unpretentious to the conditions of detention and can even grow in a garden with other vegetables. This culture sprouts very quickly, lettuce can be harvested within two to three weeks after planting the seeds.
Lettuce leaves withstand low temperatures and short frosts, so you can plant lettuce in the garden from early May, and in order to enjoy the fresh leaves of this plant throughout the season, lettuce seeds are planted throughout the season at intervals of two weeks.
Useful properties of salad
Salad is a very common culture in the world. For example, in France, 7 kg of lettuce is grown per capita annually, and in America - 16 kg. This plant is eaten in such large quantities because of its beneficial properties. Lettuce leaves contain a large amount of vitamins, they contain organic acids that have a beneficial effect on the human nervous system. Green leaves improve digestion. Due to their low calorie content, they are included in various weight loss diets. 100 g of this product contains only 12 kcal.
Seed and soil preparation
To increase the germination of seeds, they must be treated with a slightly pink solution of potassium permanganate. The seeds are soaked in solution for 10-15 minutes, and then dried well. The salad is then ready for sowing in the furrows. The best precursors for salad are courgettes, pumpkin or potatoes for which you applied a lot of organic matter. If there is no such bed on your site, then in the fall by 1 m2 planting area, you need to add a quarter of a bucket of mullein and a half-liter can of wood ash. After fertilization, the soil is dug up and well watered, and in the spring they loosen and plant a salad.
Sowing lettuce
The seeds of the lettuce are very small, so they are mixed with river sand for sowing convenience. Lettuce is sown into the furrows to a depth of no more than 1 cm. Immediately before sowing, cow humus is introduced into the groove, and the soil is loosened.
The salad needs to be thinned, if this procedure is not carried out, then its leaves will be small. Thinning seedlings allows sunlight to reach the lettuce leaves and improves air circulation.
After the first shoots of lettuce appear, the ground is irrigated with warm water. Lettuce is a moisture-loving culture, so the soil should not be allowed to dry out.