... growing and hybridizing all kinds of plants in zone 6b Maryland since the 1980's.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Frozen Lettuce

Well, I went out to check out the frozen landscape, and here's one of those volunteer lettuces frozen solid. It's been below freezing (12 degrees F this morning) for quite a while. I wonder if any of these will bounce back after they eventually thaw. Note the two weeds with red arrows... they're the weedy wild version of lettuce, Lactuca serriola that interbreeds freely with domestic lettuces producing hybrid offspring that are as prickly and bitter as the weed itself. But... the wild prickly lettuces overwinter as little rosettes like this, every year here. So it should be possible to have an edible lettuce do the same right?

1 comment:

  1. Three of these lettuce volunteers survived the winter. I just dug and moved them to the garden to hopefully get them to go to seed and gather a bunch. I'll try to post a picture of them soon.

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