HOME VEGETABLE GARDENING 
LETTUCE— THINNING AND TRANSPLANTING 
T HE one phase of growing lettuce that must be con- 
sidered of greater importance than any other is 
the need of prompt and repeated thinning out of the 
young plants. Within three weeks after seeds are sown 
the seedlings will be two to three inches tall when they 
should be thinned out to stand about two inches apart. 
The gardener who lets lettuce grow in a crowded row 
and pulls the leaves for salad when about four inches 
long will never know what quality in lettuce means. 
A week after the initial thinning, every other plant 
should be removed, thus giving each plant four inches in 
the row. The pulled up plants may be transplanted. 
This work of thinning should be continued so that at no 
time do the plants touch, let alone crowd each other. 
A final distance for the plants of a foot apart in the row 
will be found about right for the majority of the head 
lettuces, though exceptionally large-growing sorts may 
be given eighteen inches. 
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