It's Super Easy to Grow Lettuce in Containers and Have Your Own Little Salad Garden at Home

Growing garden-fresh leaves is heaven for salad lovers. I actually once had a client tell me they were mad at me for introducing homegrown lettuce into their lives because now they could never go back to the grocery-store variety.

Fortunately for that client (and for you!), it's possible to grow your own lettuce at home at least six months out of the year with this easy and inexpensive container garden DIY. If you opt for a smaller container, you could even move your lettuce plants indoors when the temps drop too low or climb too high, and have homegrown leaves year round.

Lettuce plants are incredibly easy to grow, they thrive in cool weather, and they give you harvest after harvest. So, if you're a lettuce fanatic like me, it's time to say yes to growing your own salad heaven at home.

Supplies for Salad Container Garden DIY

Without further ado, here are the four things you need to grow your own salad garden.

• A natural container with 6" depth and good drainage
• A soil mix of potting soil and compost
• A water source to provide consistent H20 to the roots of the plants
• High-quality lettuce seeds

Let's look at each of these in turn.

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A Container for Your Salad Container Garden

Ideally, you'll choose a container that's free of any chemicals that might leach into your garden's soil. From my experience, there are four types of containers that work best for container gardening:

• stainless steel containers
• wood planters
• fabric grow bags
• terra cotta pots

If you're not sure which might work best for you, learn more about the pros and cons of each of these containers.

Equally important to being made of a natural material is having good drainage. Lettuce plants like moist soil, but they don't like sitting in water all of the time. Make sure whichever container you select is at least 6 inches deep and has drainage holes that allow water to drain quickly so that your lettuce plants don’t turn soggy.

Here are a couple of my favorite containers on Amazon. I really like using those steel tubs from Behrens that you can find at pretty much every hardware store for my container gardens. They're the perfect depth for growing small leafy greens like lettuce, and they're wide enough to fit a good number of plants. You just need to drill some hills in the bottom of them for drainage.

Large Salad Garden Container

If you want to go big with your salad garden, grab one of those galvanized steel stock tanks that you see at the front of every big box store. Follow these steps to add wheels to the bottom of this planter if you'd like it to be mobile. You can fit enough lettuce plants in this container to harvest several salad bowls every week (plus, you can grow larger leafy greens, too, thanks to the extra depth). Again, you'll need to drill some holes in the bottom for drainage.

The Right Container Garden Soil

Soil is the most important element when it comes to growing lettuce in a container garden. You'll start with a bag of organic potting soil like this one or this one. Mix in some fresh organic compost (I personally love mushroom compost). Lettuce plants are actually perfectly happy growing in straight compost, but the potting soil is a good base for your container mix and will help retain some moisture.

A Water Source for Your Container Garden Plants

Lettuce is over 80 percent water, so be sure to give your salad garden plants a steady supply of H2O. Get water to the roots rather than the leaves, and be sure that the soil never dries out completely between waterings.

Check out some of my favorite small watering cans with long, narrow spouts ideal for watering the roots of container gardens here. For a larger container, it's super easy to set up your own drip irrigation system with any one of the inexpensive kits you can find online to deliver consistent water to your salad garden. Add a watering timer, and you'll have something as close to a fully automated formal irrigation system as possible, all for about $50.

High-Quality Lettuce Seeds

Salad greens are easy to start from seed, but the quality of these tiny seeds makes a huge difference. Select seeds from companies that prioritize heirloom, organic, and non-GMO products. If you can find seed companies that grow responsibly near you, even better!

Here are a couple of my favorite lettuce seeds:

• Seeds of Change Lettuce Seed Blend
• Rocky Top Lettuce Mix Salad Blend from Baker Creek Seeds
• Cosmic Crimson Lettuce Mix from Baker Creek Seeds
• Salads Greens Seeds Kit from Sustainable Sprout

Of course, you can also fill your container with well-grown lettuce starts from your local nursery. Just know that lettuce plants don't really like to be transplanted (chalk that up to their delicate little roots), so you might not get as good of production from these store-bought plants as the ones you grow from seed.

Optional Items for Your Salad Garden

Okay, I know I said you needed just four things, and that's true. But here are some things that you can add to your container garden setup as you go. Start small and then consider which of these items could improve your salad growing game.

Some additional suggestions include:

Weed Barrier Cloth

A little strip of weed barrier cloth, burlap, or even just a coffee filter placed at the bottom of your container (before soil is added) will prevent soil and nutrients from running out of the drainage holes every time you water. This is a must if you plan to bring your container garden indoors during the winter or keep it on a patio.

Garden Mesh

Grab some garden mesh to cover your salad garden to protect it from pests. (You could instead buy a couple yards of tulle from your local fabric or craft store—it's super cheap!) If you're growing outdoors, cover your container from the moment you sow your first seeds to prevent pests from entering. Salad plants don't need to be pollinated, so I keep my salad garden covered at all times unless I'm harvesting leaves.

Shade Cloth

If you're growing outdoors and want to enjoy your lettuce a little bit longer as the weather warms, shade cloth can be your friend.

Plant Tags

These are to help you remember where you planted each type of seed (even in a small container, you will forget). These hairpin-style labels look beautiful in a stainless steel container.

Grow Your Own Lettuce at Home

There's just one more thing you need to grow lettuce, and that's about 4 hours of sunlight a day. Your lettuce plants will be more productive with 6 or so hours, but they'll still grow and produce delicious leaves for you with more than partial shade. That's why lettuce is the perfect plant to grow on a covered balcony or indoors in a windowsill.

I hope this has inspired you to start your own little salad garden at home. Grab some friends and make a little container garden party, or make extra planters to give as gifts to the would-be-gardeners in your life!

Thanks for bringing back the kitchen garden with me, one salad garden at a time!