Gardening

[Guest terrydoo73]

As part of our topic in March we did some "growing" exercises with the children - we gave them each sweet pea and nasturtium seeds to plant in individual troughs and then planted in some violas and hung them to our window grills. The violas have done really well and are a bit leggy now but the sweet pea and nasturtium did not come as well - maybe plant them in individual pots next year! We also "hid" some scallion/onion bulbs in our compost tray which were then individually planted into pots by the children as found. The children also planted and grew their own sunflower and lettuce seeds and we had a few left over so put them aside. We then got a number of large planters and put the yoghurt pots with the grown lettuce plants and onion bulbs into the soil in the pot. There was a packet of lettuce seeds left over so with a few children planted these into 2 planters - red and green lettuce came up very vigorously so much so that I would need to thin them out now.

 

I was thinking of taking out the lettuce plants that are in yoghurt pots and putting them on a bit of old guttering thereby having enough room to thin out the other lettuce seeds. Would they still grow? Also when do I start harvesting? One of our volunteers tried out some of the rosso lettuce today and it tasted yummy!

 

What have you grown in your setting that has failed or succeeded - just so we can try it next year - I am already thinking of the autumn time and bulbs!

[AnonyMouse_73]

You can harvest lettuce leaves any time, and usually this is how you thin them out..use smaller ones in sandwiches, leaving the other to grow on. Small lettuce are tricky to thin because you can damage the root very easily.

 

Larger plants can be moved. Just make sure you water them well.

[AnonyMouse_3139]

When I grew lettuce we regulary popped to the patch to cut a few lea\ves for a sandwich. A bit like herbs really, take what you need and leave the rest to grow.