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Growing lettuce in winter
I bought some small lettuce plants that were on sale in a garden centre. However, I don't know if they are supposed to grow over winter or if I'm supposed to keep them going until the summer when they will grow properly. Some of the plants are called "Red Salad Bowl Rushmoor" and the others are called "Butterhead Barilla". They are in the greenhouse now in small pots but I could also put them in a grow bag outside under a polytunnel.
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hi
im not sure where you live, but they should be fine in the poly tunnel unless we have an exceptionally cold spell, i assume you wouldnt fancy salad then anyhow!
Perhaps surprisingly some lettuce are quite hardy. They do grow much more slowly as it gets colder and you usually grow 'cut and come again' types over the winter. I'd leave them in the greenhouse. With a bit of luck you'll get useable amounts of leaves from them if you just remove the leaves as you need them and treat them like the aforementioned types. I've grown cos types which have actually frozen in the GH but amazingly thawed and didn't die!
When spring comes (if they are still alive), they will just go to seed so you can't keep them for next year per se.
Last November I bought a box of living salad from Lidl, 99p, I got 13 plants. I planted them in the greenhouse, they grew and grew right through the winter and I ended up pulling them out to plant the tomatoes in June. Just pick the outside leaves and they just keep growing.
I will never bother to sow seeds again.