Friday, May 15, 2009

baby red romaine lettuce

red romaine

Its definitely lettuce weather! I'm enjoying watching the plants grow. They love the cool spring rains.

I have about 10 lettuce varieties. This is red romaine. One of the types in my Valentine mix of red lettuces. Other varieties I have growing are Prizehead (my favorite), red oak leaf (another favorite), broad leaf escarole, Bibb, Boston, Merveille, and a couple other frilly red leaved types.

lettuce (Lactuca sativa)

15 comments:

MarianLondon(UK) said...

Lovely strong plant Kathy. I have done Yugoslavian Red (amongst others)a green/yellow/red combination. I saw it in a catalogue and had to have it! I hope the first batch survive they started off strong under cover and now net, but it has been so dry and windy here and our lottie is quiet exposed but, at last, we had a good downpour last night. A good weekend to all gardening folk out there!
MarianLondon(UK)

vuejardin said...

The lettuce looks healthy, it's such a beautiful color! I have a green romaine lettuce, it's growing very slow, still small size.

Daphne said...

I'm a red lettuce lover too. I tried prizehead last year and it never really grew for me. I'm back to my leaf lettuces.

Anonymous said...

hot and humid here in Augusta GA. do you use any summer crisp lettuce varieties? great photos...
www.mlchgarden.blogspot.com

Omah's Helping Hands said...

I've never heard of red romaine! Thank you for sharing. I'll have to look into it. Am putting in my garden this weekend. Hopefully the weather will hold out finally. We've had frost at night lately.

Annie*s Granny said...

I'm growing Red Romaine this year, too. It starts out with such a lovely, bright burgundy color that is so pretty in the salads, but it does get much paler with maturity. Prizehead has been my very favorite for years and years, and this year I'm falling in love with Buttercrunch for its pretty little semi-heads. Yugoslavian Red is also proving to be a pretty lettuce. I think I plant lettuce for its beauty even more than for eating!

Dawnie (CT) said...

I've never heard of red romaine either; look's great!
I transplanted a bunch of lettuce last Sunday. The leaves weren't "crisp" and after transplant....they wilted. I just let them be to see if they would crisp up....not. But new leaves are forming, so I just plucked the wilted/dead ones off. Is that normal for lettuce to do that?

trish from SE PA said...

I am trying some butter crunch with the onions.The red stuff looks lovely. Finally got some peppers to plant, hope they will do well. Anybody had success with getting rid of mint in the garden? I don't mind some but it is taking over the strawberries and I sooo want them to do well. I hear tomatoes like mint, can you put some pulled leaves aorund the bottom of the tomato plants? I wanted to thank you for all the good info you post. Next year will be a much more compact and row-like sample of a garden in my yard. I hate conformity but it seems easier to tell what's where.

Peggy said...

Looks great! I love red lettuces for the great color in a salad!

kathy said...

Yes, red romaine is very pretty as a baby plant, then it is not so pretty later.

I'll look for Yugoslavian Red and butter crunch seeds. These sound nice.

Prizehead needs very full sun to look good I think.

I do grow summer crisp in the heat of the summer. I'll start this variety soon. Its my 'warm weather lettuce'. The ones mentioned above are my 'cool weather lettuces'. I grew Cherokee summer crisp last year, which was very nice.

Sorry about the mint. No choice but to dig up them when you spot them. They sounds like the raspberries and sunchokes in my plot. Arrgh. I grow my mint in pots only. Sometimes I dig the pots into the ground. Our community gardens recommend NO mints, raspberries, and a list of 10 or 15 other invasive plants.

Matron said...

Yes, you are right, it is good lettuce weather - just balmy and moist. Mine are racing ahead.

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Herry said...

I really like red romaine because of its colors and also looks very beautiful.

Dawnie (CT) said...

To Trish. I had read that pouring HOT, BOILING water on weeds will kill them permanently. So, I tried it, pouring water on some weeds and mint that were where I was going to plant some beans. IT WORKED! : ) Just be sure not to pour hot, boiling water on the things you do NOT want to kill off.

trish from SE PA said...

thanx for the tips, I will let you know how it goes.