Q: I am growing lettuce for the first time in raised beds and have been really impressed with the results. How should I collect the seeds, so I can sow them again next year? A: Lettuces are a ...

"So exciting!" Gardener shares money-saving method to grow endless supply of popular produce: 'Infinite food glitch' first ...

This weekend's garden jobs include removing unneeded tree staking, too-tight tree wraps, and excess mulch, saving seeds from mature vegetable plants, and taking steps to get those green tomatoes ...

Keep the soil moist and you’ll see plants in just five to seven days. Also note just because a seed packet says 50 days to maturity the vegetables may be just starting to yield ripe vegetables then.

You can browse through expansive lettuce seed catalogs at rareseeds.com, territorialseed.com, and trueloveseeds.com. For more Food & Wine news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!

We can grow the leaf lettuces. Those take 40 to 50 days to reach peak size. You can even cut them at a much smaller size if you just can’t wait.

A transplant will grow into harvestable lettuce within two or three weeks of planting, while lettuce seeds sown directly in the soil won’t be ready for at least 8 weeks.

Starting with transplants instead of seed makes it much easier. Showy colored vegetables are higher in antioxidants, so be sure your salad has plenty of the red and burgundy forms of lettuce.