Types of Lettuce

Looseleaf Lettuces

The easiest to grow! Leaves from looseleaf lettuces can be picked as baby leaves each day for your salads if you plant them about 10cm (4") apart. Or, space 25cm (10") apart for full-sized leaves.

French Crisp Lettuces

Crisp like an iceberg, these lettuces are never bitter in summer heat, have real flavour, and are easy to grow. They are also called Batavian lettuces and start out open but eventually form a compact head or bunch. Grow for heads or pick individual leaves for salad mixes.

Oakleaf Looseleaf Lettuces

Have gorgeous long leaves with deeply-notched, rounded edges and are well suited to daily harvests of individual leaves or of a lovely, ruffled, full-sized plant.

Butterheads or Boston Lettuces

Have loose outer leaves surrounding pale, slightly oily, loose, soft heads. Bibb types (named after the man who developed them) have a more open centre—like a green rose. Both types make small heads and can be planted 20–25cm (8–10") apart.

Romaine Lettuces

Need a more fertile soil than leaf lettuces to attain full size.

Iceberg Lettuces

To achieve the "head" typical of icebergs, thin these plants early to 30cm (12") apart in fertile soil. Sow from mid-April to mid-July.