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Vegetable Gardening

cut and Come Again lettuce method

14 years ago

Hello All! Everyone is so helpful here and being new I am full of questions. I looked to see if it has been posted elsewhere but I haven't found anything. I am growing lettuce mesclun mix and want to use the cut an come again method. When can I start cutting leaves off the individual plants? They are about 4-5 in. tall now. Each lettuce plant has 4-6 leaves. How many times can I cut off leaves off each plant? Also, can I do the same cut method with spinach? Thanks again for the help! :-)

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Comments (7)

Ali Eggenburg Alldredge
14 years ago
I cut it all off and leave about a half inch from the root. I takes about a week to grow back to cutting length again.

ali

Here is a link that might be useful: My garden blog
albert_135 　 39.17°N 119.76°W 4695ft.
14 years ago
My grandmother would broadcast surplus seeds of "greens", lettuce, turnip, beets etc. She would have kids cut them all off. Some would be quite small like the tiny leafed salads sold in sacks at the supermarket.

After the daytime temperatures warmed up the lettuce would get bitter and would be sorted out after cutting. Collards would take over the area later in the summer.
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roma2009
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks! I am going to start cutting them and enjoying them now.
mtinaz
14 years ago
So I just go out and pick enough leaves for a salad and kinda rotate plats so each still has some leaves. Have I been doing it wrong? Should I just cut the whole thing?
jwstell42
14 years ago
Mtinaz - that's how I do it as well, and it has worked great so far.
cassieinmass
14 years ago
MTINAZ- I do it the same way....It does get kinda overgrown if you dont pick them much. I always pick mine for me and my guinea pigs...-cass
lisazone6_ma
14 years ago
I just harvested my first spinach from the garden last night for supper - I just went thru the patch and cut off the largest leaves, leaving the rest.

I couldn't separate out the tiny plants from the batch of mesclun greens I started indoors so I ended up planting them in bunches so I have tons of plants all tightly packed together. I'm going to wait until each "clump" will give me enough for a decent salad, then shear them off and leave the stubs and see what grows back. I might pull a few of the plants at the same time to give them more room to spread. They are packed in those clumps pretty tight!

I planted them last year (just scattered the seed) but I was only growing it for my daughter's pet rabbit. When I saw how easy it was to grow tho, I decided to plant some for myself this year. From now on tho, I'm just direct sowing. The direct sowed stuff is larger than the stuff I started indoors and I didn't have to fuss over it, watering and turning lights on and off!

Has anyone ever scattered seed over their bed before putting it to sleep for the winter? I was thinking since lettuces and spinach can take the cold and wet and be planted so early, maybe I can prepare their area in fall, scatter the seed and just leave it to sprout in the spring?

Lisa

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