One of the best gardening books I’ve read in a long time is “Garden Secrets” by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent and Diane E. Bilderback. Most garden books tell you about how to grow plants which this book does. It goes beyond that though by including information on how day length and temperature affect germination, blooming etc. For instance, some varieties of lettuce grown near street lights can bolt before they normally would as the light from the lamps fool the plants into ‘thinking’ the days are longer than they actually are. I sought this information out after reading someone’s bitter lettuce tale on one of the garden boards I frequent. It reminded me of my own bitter lettuce that was started under lights last year. I had the lights on for 15 hours a day thinking the longer days would mean larger plants. While it probably did it also meant bitter plants.

The 90+F weather outside has me wanting some lettuce and I have a nice cool basement that should work fine. I used a 72 cell float tray and a plastic container from WallyWorld to hold the water. I will need to get another light which is one reason why I only seeded 4 rows (3-4 seeds in each cell, hoping for 2 to sprout) in the float tray and even that was pushing it. Once I include the second light I can seed the outer rows and will have staggered plantings. I set the one light I do have on a 12hrs on / 12hrs off schedule as per the book above. Keeping my fingers crossed