If you’re limited in space or don’t have access to a garden, you can plant your lettuce seeds in a hanging basket or in containers and align them along your windowsill. You can begin to grow your lettuce seeds inside if the weather is too unpredictable or if it’s more convenient. Place the seeds at the same depth you would in a garden, but place them in some potting soil within a container. Transfer to garden when the lettuce have 4 leaves. Lettuce is commonly grown from seeds. But it also can be regrown from scraps. This won’t provide as large of a harvest as your initial planting, but it is an inexpensive and easy way to get more lettuce. To do this, cut off the bottom of the lettuce, leaving only about an inch of leaves on the base. Put the base in a shallow dish of water by a sunny window. Change the water every couple of days. You should see some root and leaf growth in about a week. Harvest the leaves in two weeks. At this point, they’ll likely be as large as they will grow and will only degrade from there. Growing Lettuce Hydroponically: If you get these basics down, you can have home-grown lettuce all through the year. Tom Thumb is a good option if you’re trying to take up a little less room, Bibb lettuce is a little bit of an easier variety to grow, and Romaine works well but takes a bit more time. Consider the slightly different requirements and tendencies that your particular type has. There are many different kinds of hydroponic systems that you can grow plants in, including drip systems, NFT systems, ebb-flow systems, aeroponic systems, and many more. Water culture systems, in which plants float directly on top of water while their roots grow down and absorb nutrients, are the most effective and simplistic. You have a lot of different media options to choose from, including: rockwool, coco fiber, vermiculite, pine shavings, river rock, sand, and many more. All of these options have positive and negative aspects, but picking any one of them will allow you to grow lettuce without a problem. Rockwool is the most popular medium choice and is both sterile and porous. If you go with rockwool, be careful to keep it from becoming too saturated. This can lead to root suffocation, stem rot, and root rot. Grow rock is another popular option that has a neutral pH and holds moisture well. This medium is reusable if cleaned thoroughly, which can be beneficial for growing hydroponically in your home, but might be tedious on a larger scale. Purchase a large storage container or fish tank to use as a nutrient reservoir for your lettuce. Choose a container with a large surface area, but also make sure it’s at least 8inches (20 cm) deep so that the plant roots can grow downward without trouble. Do not use a metal container as your nutrient reservoir. Metals can corrode or oxidize, releasing chemicals that can disrupt the supply of nutrients to your plant. Prepare net pots and floating platforms. There are several different materials, such as a Styrofoam or the lid of your reservoir container, that you can use to set up a stable way for your plants to sit above the water with their roots submerged. Drill holes into polystyrene planks that are about twelve inches apart. Drill as many holes and get as many net pots as will accommodate each seedling that you have. You’ll need to have a system in place that creates air bubbles or recirculates the water in your reservoir so that the plant roots don’t suffocate. Keeping an aquarium pump in your reservoir will prevent this issue. Buy nutrient combinations at gardening stores that are specifically for growing hydroponic plants. Lettuce typically requires high levels of potassium, calcium, and magnesium. Follow the nutrient kit directions for mixing the nutrients with water and put the mixture in your container. Some lettuce types are more sensitive to nitrogen that others, so make sure that the nutrients that you purchase are for the right kind of lettuce. Before putting your hydroponic system to use, you’ll need to use an egg carton or plugs, which are small cells, to create a stable initial environment for your plants. Fill your plugs with your medium of choice and with your hydroponic seeds. In order to get your lettuce started, water your nursery every other day and keep it in a well-lit or naturally sunny area where it is between 65° and 80° Fahrenheit (18.3-26.6° Celsius). Grow these until the seedlings are 2 inches (5 cm) tall and have about 4 leaves. Carefully, without tugging, take your individual seedlings from their cells to the net pots. Align each net pot with the holes you drilled into the floating platform or lid of the container, and then place them in your reservoir. Unlike other plants, lettuce neither requires a long duration nor an intense amount of exposure to light in order to grow. You have other options, but fluorescent lighting is the best because it requires a low initial investment, consumes a small amount of power, and produces a low amount of heat. Give the plants 10-14 hours lighting per day. Keep the temperature around 55° Fahrenheit (12.7° Celsius) at night and around 75° Fahrenheit(23.8° Celsius) during the day. If the lettuce gets too hot it will bolt, or flower, which isn’t good because this will create a bitter taste in the lettuce leaves. Test the pH with an inexpensive paper strip test and make sure it’s slightly acidic to almost neutral for the best possible production. Purchase both up and down pH adjusters that, when added to your reservoir, will be able to bring the pH back to the correct level. After 5-6 weeks, your lettuce should be fully grown and ready to pick and eat! To make sure that your lettuce plants continue to produce large amounts of healthy lettuce, pick the outer leaves and leave some of the inner ones attached to the plant. It won’t take much time for those inner leaves to replace the ones you picked. Avoid picking all of the leaves from each plant at once. Pick leaves from one plant one day and another plant a few days later. This will allow you to enjoy the right amount of lettuce at a time, instead of going through periods of not enough production or too much production. If the lettuce is fully grown and you don’t want to eat it right away, keep the plants rooted and store them in a humid, nearly freezing environment to ensure freshness for up to a month. Hydroponic gardens should be well ventilated to help your plants get the CO2 they need and prevent the growth of molds and bacteria. Leave a door or window open near the plants, or consider installing a vent with an exhaust fan if you are growing your lettuce in an enclosed space. Place your hydroponic garden under a ceiling fan, or set up an oscillating floor fan nearby and set it on low. Make sure any nearby windows are covered with a fine-mesh insect screen. Check the screen for holes and tears. Any vents should also be screened. Algae tend to flourish in the damp conditions of a hydroponic garden. However, algae cannot grow without direct sunlight. If your lettuce is exposed to direct sun during the day, put a shade over the plants. If you are having issues with water-borne molds and other diseases, sanitize your equipment with a 2% bleach solution or a commercial sanitizer such as Green Shield. Sterilize all pots, reservoirs, tanks, and any other equipment that contains or supplies water that will come into contact with the plants. Replace any contaminated growing media. If you follow the instructions, your lettuce will be free of pesticides. Check the water level daily;your lettuce will not grow if the roots are not getting water. If you want to grow your hydroponic lettuce in a hanging basket or window box, be sure to choose a lightweight growing medium, such as vermiculite, so that the container doesn’t get too heavy.