Growing Salad Greens In Gutters
Sowing seed of salad leaves in lengths of guttering can help keep your seedlings safe from slugs and snails and enable you to transplant the whole row into the soil as and when soil space becomes available.
Growing salad greens in gutters. We always think of spinach and lettuce as the main spring greens but there are many more to choose from. They allow you to grow many plants and herbs and gardeners typically use them to grow annuals with shallow roots along with herbs greens and flowers. The best garden gutter plants are those with spreading roots instead of those that continue to grow downward. Types of salad greens.
In all cases you want to make a clean cut using a knife or scissors. Jan feb mar apr may jun jul aug sep oct nov dec. Today there hundreds of different cultivars of greens to choose from and along with the lettuces you may wish to grow other greens such as. It is easier to take care of but you do need to look at it daily.
A couple of tips for growing lettuce in gutters. Greens lettuce spinach and colorful salad greens. A creative and effective solution is to use rain gutters on the sunny side of the house and grow your plants that way. How to grow greens in a pot.
With rain gutter you can actually make a wonderful herb garden right in these pipes. Lettuce is one of the oldest veggies developed from prickly lettuce which as its name suggests was a less than desirable green by weeding out the less desirable traits such as the spines a more edible lettuce was created. Common plants grown in gutters include the following. The best idea is to hang them outside the kitchen window.
Gutter gardens work well for growing plants that you d typically place in a 4 inch pots. Succulent plants generally have spreading roots and grow perfectly in shallow containers such as a portion of gutter. How to grow salad leaves in guttering. Being in a gutter the soil will dry out faster and the temperature will fluctuate in larger increments.
5 herb gardening with rain gutter. Most greens will re grow after cutting as long as you leave about a half inch of plant behind. By bbc gardeners world magazine. Look to the east asian greens such as napa cabbage tatsoi pac choi or bok choy mibuna santoh and hon tsai tai are especially suited to growing in cool spring weather.
There are many ways to harvest salad greens. This may work beautifully if your deck is on the sunny side of the house. Find out how to grow salad leaves in guttering in our video guide. Short 1m lengths of guttering are convenient and easy to handle.
Besides the plants already mentioned you can try. Many people love growing herbs in their house after all it is a great idea to grow herbs right in your house and not to go to the market to purchase a certain herb. When the salad seeds germinate simply grow them on for two to four weeks and then slide the plants into their final. If you have never tasted any of these greens then you are in for a treat.
There are many creative ways to use rain gutters in gardening. Make sure soil is at least 45 degrees and you have to keep the soil moist pretty much the entire growing season. Individual leaves may be picked entire heads may be cut cutting mixes and leaf lettuce may be cropped off with.