When & how is it best to do it?

When is lettuce harvested?

Picking lettuce / lettuce and lettuce can usually be harvested 6 to 8 weeks (lamb's lettuce even 12 weeks) after the sowing take place. The lettuce plants should now have reached a size of 15 to 20 cm. So if you sow in February, the first lettuce harvest can already take place in May. Lettuce can also be harvested before it is fully mature. That is a good thing, because otherwise you would have an excess of lettuce plants that are ready for harvest and cannot be eaten all at once.
Care should also be taken to ensure that the lettuce plant is harvested before flowering. With summer salads in particular, it is often the case that the lettuce "shoots up" and forms an inflorescence. At this stage of growth the leaves become bitter and inedible.

There is an enormous variety of types of lettuce, so you can harvest lettuce almost all year round.

• In spring: lamb's lettuce (end of February), winter radiccio (end of February), winter endive (end of February), pick and cut lettuce (April / May)
• In summer: lettuce (May-September), summer radiccio (June / July), ice-cream salad (July-September)
• In autumn: endives, sugar loaf (October-December), lamb's lettuce (November-February)
• In winter: winter radiccio (October-February), lamb's lettuce (October-May)

How do you harvest lettuce?

A distinction must be made here between lettuce and plucked / cut salads. Pick / cut salad is a variant of the garden salad. In contrast to lettuce, it does not form a head, but rather loose leaf rosettes.
When harvesting plucked / cut salads, the lower lettuce leaves can be harvested for consumption, but the Heart leaves are left standing so that new leaves can grow back and multiple harvests are possible is. Lamb's lettuce and rocket can also be harvested several times if you are careful not to cut them too short.
This is not possible with lettuce, here you cut off the entire stalk close to the ground. By means of time-shifted reseeding at intervals of three to six weeks, however, appropriate harvest replenishment can be provided and the harvest period can be extended enormously.

What happens after the harvest?

Of course, it is always best to eat it immediately after the harvest, but lettuce and lettuce, despite their fragility, can be kept for about two days in the refrigerator at approx. zero degrees Celsius and a humidity just below 100%.

Tips & Tricks

Cover winter salads with brushwood / fleece so that the lettuce can also be harvested under the snow.