Are You Ready for the Best-Tasting Salads of Your Life?

You reach for that bag of mixed leaves at the grocery store because you know you need to eat more greens, right? And if you're like most of us, you let that bag sit a little too long at the back of your produce drawer, don't you? And then you toss it out.

Salad isn’t meant to come from a plastic bag. It should come from your own garden!

Freshly cut garden greens taste so much better than store-bought. And, after the initial investment of garden setup, you can harvest loads of greens for the price you'd pay for one small bag at the store.

If you're new to gardening or don't have a ton of space, don't worry. Salad greens make great starter plants, and you can get a ton of leaves from a small container.

I don't know about you, but I'm ready to leave my sad salad era by growing my own and enjoying the most flavor and nutrition. This guide has everything you need to elevate your greens game. We'll start with all the different types of plants you can grow in your salad garden. Then we'll look at how to set up your growing space (whether that's a raised bed or a small container) how to tend your salad garden, and finally, how to harvest from your salad garden.

Reason Number One: Homegrown Greens Are Better for You & for the Planet

Most of the leaves that you find on the shelves of grocery stores have been treated with synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and pre-emergent herbicides to prevent pest pressure and disease. Not only are all these chemicals bad for you, their use also has major repercussions for our climate and for the farm workers who handle them.

Once the leaves are harvested, they're tossed into non-reusable plastic packaging and trucked all over the country to grocery stores and supermarkets. No matter how much care is taken to keep these leaves fresh, they often turn brown and soggy, and whole bags end up tossed into the trash. (I'm pretty sure that soggy spinach is the number one cause of food waste in our country.)

Every time you harvest leaves from your own garden, you're minimizing single-use plastic packaging, reducing food trucking and fuel consumption, and preventing food waste. Think about the benefits for the planet if enough of us do this!

Reason Number Two: You'll Enjoy Better Flavors & More Texture in Your Salad Bowls

Leaves don't store well. But to reach a shelf near you, they have to travel hundreds, maybe even thousands, of miles. That's because most of our lettuce and leafy greens are grown in just two places in the US: California and Arizona. After all that travel, your bag of spring mix might sit in the store for days before you bring it home.

Many consumers are led to believe that there are only a handful of salad greens worth eating. In reality, the greens you find at the store are just the ones that stay fresh longest. They're hardly representative of the hundreds of varieties of lettuce alone you can grow. There are so many different flavors to explore when you grow your own, and you'll enjoy them when they're fresher, better-tasting, and at their nutritional peak.

Reason Number Three: Leafy Greens Are Super Easy to Grow

I talk about this a lot in my new book, Leaves, Roots & Fruit, but basically, plants that we grow for their leaves are the simplest and easiest to grow. That's because leaves are one of the first things a plant produces. We can begin harvesting leaves in a matter of weeks, instead of spending months fertilizing and pruning these plants while we wait for flowers and fruits to form.

A faster time to harvest means fewer opportunities for things to go wrong. It also means fewer tending tasks required of you.

All we really have to do to grow leafy greens is set them up in some good soil, keep them watered, and protect them from pests (more on all that later).

Reason Number Four: You Can Harvest a Ton of Leaves from a Small Space

Most of our favorite leafy greens don't take up that much space. The root systems of salad greens are small, which means they don't need a large garden to thrive. You can grow a productive salad garden in containers.

Even though they're small plants, they're super productive. These plants are what we call "cut and come again". That means you can harvest leaves, give the plants time to recover, and then return to harvest some more! You'll be amazed how many leaves you can get from even a small space.

The Best Greens to Grow in a Salad Garden

Let's start off by getting to know some of our wonderful salad garden plants, some of which you might not find at the grocery store.

You can start harvesting leaves from small plants like arugula, mizuna, spinach, and lettuce types like spring mix in as little as 40 days. Many people prefer the taste of baby leaves, so the sooner you cut, the better!

Bigger salad plants like kale and Swiss chard require more time to grow after being planted in your garden. But on the bright side, these plants can last several seasons, if not years, in your garden, meaning you'll be able to harvest from them again and again.

Smaller Leafy Greens

• Arugula
• Lettuce
• Mizuna
• Purple Mustard
• Romaine
• Spinach

Larger Leafy Greens

• Blue Curled Scotch Kale
• Napa Cabbage
• Red Russian Kale
• Swiss Chard
• Toscano Kale

Salad Garden Plant Families

My goal is to broaden your horizons in terms of all the different things you can plant for a salad garden. There are so many different types of plants that will fill your salad bowl with flavor. It's easiest to group salad plants into their plant families since they share many important characteristics, like their temperature preferences. Of course, there are still other plants that could be included in your salad garden, but I think you'll find these three different types of plants will really round out your garden.

The Aster Family

Well-known plants in this family include loose leaf lettuce, romaine (cos) lettuce, iceberg lettuce, butterhead lettuce, and bibb lettuce. Generally speaking, when you think about a salad garden, you're most likely thinking of this family. But within the Aster family, there are so many fun heirloom lettuce varieties that you would never get to experience if the only leaves you ever eat come from the grocery store. Some of my favorites include radicchio, endive, buttercrunch, and escarole. Black-Seeded Simpson is also a super fast lettuce that's easy to grow. 

Lettuce plants can be tightly planted for frequent harvests. They generally prefer cooler weather, so somewhere between 45°F and 75°F is optimal.

Many Aster plants are packaged into fun seed mixes so that you can plant a variety in your salad garden. Just like you can buy a box of spring mix at the store, you can plant your own spring mix in your garden. My all-time favorite lettuce mix is Rocky Top Lettuce Mix from Baker Creek Seeds. These seeds turned me into an avid salad gardener. Rocky Top is the perfect blend of red lettuces and speckled lettuces and green lettuces—so sweet and tasty!

The Brassica Family

Here we have our cruciferous vegetables like arugula, cabbage, mustard, and kale. This family includes some of the most nutritious plants you can give your body. Brassicas generally prefer cooler temps, but my own experience has shown that some of these plants can withstand warmer weather much better than Aster plants. My kale plants often made it through hot summers in Houston.

Kale plants, collard greens, and mustard greens can grow pretty large. Some of my favorite types of kale are red Russian, blue curled scotch kale, and Toscano kale, aka dinosaur kale. Young kale leaves are tender and delicious in salads, while more mature leaves make great kale chips and smoothies.

If you're a beginner gardener, I always recommend starting with slow bolt arugula. It's one of the easiest plants to grow from seed, and it just keeps going.

For mustards, I recommend purple Osaka and Florida broadleaf. Mizuna is a type of mustard, but it typically has more serrated leaves. It tastes pretty peppery and is so fun to add to freshly picked salads.

The Amaranth Family

This family includes two favorites, spinach and Swiss chard. These plants prefer cooler temps, but Swiss chard can withstand some heat. Like kale, it's a biennial plant, so it's willing to put up with a lot to survive for two full years in your garden. Spinach can be grown in a teeny tiny amount of space, while Swiss chard can grow pretty large.

Swiss chard is so beautiful and so good for your body. My favorite varieties include Bright Lights and Fordhook. For spinach, I recommend Bloomsdale longstanding.

Salad Garden Sunlight Requirements

Your salad garden needs to receive at least four hours of sunlight to give you good leaf production. During warmer months, it's best to give your garden some afternoon shade. That late afternoon sun can be a bit too brutal on your tender salad greens. During the colder months, you can let your salad garden get more hours of light because the sun is farther away and the temps are lower.

The Best Raised Beds & Containers for Your Salad Garden

You can grow your own salad garden in a variety of ways based on your available space.

Container Salad Gardens

If you have limited space, such as a sunny windowsill or small patio, check out our container salad garden ideas. The best types of containers for your leafy greens include stainless steel containers, wood planters, fabric grow bags (pictured below), and terra cotta pots. If you're not sure which might work for you, learn more about the pros and cons of each of these containers. My favorite containers are the galvanized steel ones from Behrens, which you should be able to find at any big box store.

Salad garden planters only need to be 6 inches deep and about a foot wide to give you lettuce, arugula, and spinach harvests for a dinner salad. Growing a small salad garden is the best way to get started, so I'll walk you through the steps to set your container up in a bit.

If you have a little bit more space, like on a patio or deck, you could grow tons of salad plants in a stock tank, aka cattle trough. These are food-safe and really easy to set up. You can even add wheels to the bottom to make a rolling planter.

Raised-Bed Salad Gardens

If you have a spot where you could install a 4 ft. x 4 ft. raised bed, you could build your own super simple salad box. Here's your step by step to build a salad box like mine.

And for those of you who already have raised beds installed, consider growing lots of smaller leafy greens along the outer edges of your raised beds.

The Best Soil Mix for Your Salad Garden

I've found that sandy loam soil mixed with lots of compost is ideal for growing salad. You can create your own sandy loam soil by mixing equal parts topsoil, compost, and coarse sand (think paver sand). You can grab bags for all three at your local hardware store. I like to mix in a little bit of worm castings after to add extra organic material.

While you're grabbing bags to fill your garden, I highly recommend grabbing a drip irrigation kit to use inside your garden. They're easy to set up and automate, and they'll deliver consistent water to your salad greens. We'll talk more about watering your garden later, but you'll see that consistency is key.

How to Set Up a Container Salad Garden

You can still get a ton of greens out of a smaller container, believe it or not. Follow these three steps to prepare your container for planting:

STEP ONE: Add Drainage Holes if Needed

While salad garden plants like a moist soil, they don't like sitting in water all of the time. Your container will need drainage holes that allow excess water to drain quickly. If your container doesn't have a way of letting out water, use a drill to add drainage holes on the bottom every 6 inches or so.

STEP TWO: Cover the Bottom

Cut a piece of weed barrier cloth or burlap a little bigger than the width and length of your container and place it at the bottom so that the edges fold up the sides of your container just a bit. The purpose of this cloth is to prevent soil from washing out of your container every time it’s watered and making a mess, which is important if you plan to bring your container garden indoors during winter or keep it on a patio.

STEP Three: Fill with soil

Fill your container with high-quality organic potting soil mixed with compost or the sandy loam soil mix. Moisten the soil mix a bit before putting it in the container. Make sure to keep you weed barrier cloth against the edge of your planter as you add soil. If you’re starting with seeds, then fill your little planter all the way to the top.

You Can Grow Your Own Salad Greens 6 Months of the Year, No Matter Where You Live

For many of us, it's just not possible to grow salad greens year round unless we have cold frames or greenhouses to help us push through the coldest months. During those months, we'll obviously need to buy bags of lettuce and arugula from the store.

We can, however, begin growing frost-tolerant greens 30 to 60 days before our last anticipated frost in spring. We can then grow lots of greens throughout our cool season and into our warm season. When the weather gets hot, we can switch to heat-tolerant greens, and then we can push frost-tolerant greens long past our first frost date.

In cold climates, that's about 6 months of salad greens production throughout the year. In warmer climates, that could be 12 months of production, as long as you're growing the right plants for the weather. When I lived in Houston, we could grow arugula year round.

Let's look at what your salad garden production could look like based on your climate.

Salad Greens by Season

There are three different seasons for growing leafy greens. First, there's the cool season, which is prime salad garden time. This is when the temperature ranges from 35°F to 64°F. The next season is the warm season, when your average high temps are between 65°F and 84°F. The final season is the hot season, when temps spike above 85°F. It's the most difficult season to grow salad plants, though there are still plenty of plants that you can have growing to keep your salad bowl full.

Leafy Greens to Grow in the Cool Season

There are so many things to grow in the cool season: all the lettuce varieties from the Aster family; arugula, kale, collards, mustards, and cabbage from the Brassica family; and spinach and Swiss chard from the Amaranth family. 

Brassicas and Amaranths can handle some frost. Lettuce plants, however, are more frost sensitive. The best time to grow Asters is during what we call the shoulder seasons (in other words, right after your final frost date and right before your first frost date of the season).

Leafy Greens to Grow in the Warm Season

Some of the best greens for the warm season include arugula, kale, mustards, and mizuna from the Brassica family, plus Swiss chard from the Amaranth family. Most Aster plants will begin struggling once the weather warms, though red leaf lettuces and special varieties like Jericho romaine can hang on longer than others. Similarly, spinach does not like warmer weather and will bolt, or go to seed, when the temps rise and the days lengthen.

Leafy Greens to Grow in the Hot Season

Some of the hot season greens include Brassicas like kale, Southern mustard greens, mizuna, and arugula, plus Swiss chard. I could grow arugula year round in Houston, even when the temperatures spiked over 100 degrees, which is definitely not true for other salad greens.

This is the time to get a little more creative with your plants as you switch to more heat-resistant greens for the next couple of months. There's Malabar Spinach, which is not technically spinach at all. It's a climbing plant that looks beautiful on trellises throughout the heat of the summer. There's also New Zealand spinach (also not really spinach), which is tasty and super easy to grow. These summer greens have a different taste than you’d expect from a grocery store salad box.

The Best Salad Garden Spacing

On farms, you might see cabbages planted in rows with big spaces in between each plant, but we're growing in much smaller spaces. My general goal is to squeeze as many plants into each container or raised bed as possible, and my philosophy is that if a weed can grow in a space, then there should be something edible growing there instead.

Smaller Leafy Greens

Small plants only require three to six square inches each. This is the ideal spacing for looseleaf lettuces, spinach, and arugula. As long as you harvest often (our main goal), the plants can be kept small and grow right alongside each other. That means you can fit anywhere from 9 to 16 small plants per square foot of garden space. If, instead, you want them to grow to their full size before harvest, keep it to no more than 4 to 5 plants per square foot.

Larger Leafy Greens

Head lettuces, Swiss chard, and pretty much every Brassica except for arugula needs more space. These plants can grow pretty large, so they obviously also need more time in the garden to grow.

Give these larger plants 81 to 144 square inches of space to themselves. That's basically one plant per square foot.

Salad Garden Planting Plan

Whether you're growing in a raised bed or container, there are three categories of plants to consider for your layout: small plants for the border, larger plants for the middle, and interrupters.

Smaller Plants for the Border

These plants fit nicely in the corners and along the edges of your raised bed or container. Border plants include most of our lettuces, spinach, mizuna, and arugula. I also love to tuck in some flowers like marigolds around the edges of my salad garden. They make it prettier, and you can toss some edible flower petals into your salad bowl for some color.

Larger Plants for the Middle

Leafy greens like kale, Swiss chard, cabbage, and mustards should go in the middle of the garden (or the back if your garden is up against a wall).

Interrupters

Interrupters are plants that aid the salad garden by interrupting pests that might come to munch on your leaves. Parsley and chives are two of my favorite interrupters. They also just so happen to be beautiful and easy-to-grow plants that add lots of flavor to your salad bowl. Flowers are also great because they'll attract beneficial insects to your garden.

The Best Salad Garden Layout

First, figure out what will go along your borders. It's like framing a picture. Then, place your larger plants in the middle of the garden. Fill in the spaces around those larger plants with more small plants and with interrupters.

For example, you might put some looseleaf lettuces around the border of your large container garden. Let's go ahead and add some chives (interrupters) and pansies to the border, as well. You might plant some Swiss chard in the middle and then fill in around them with parsley and maybe some spinach or mustards.

I know this is a unique way to plant a salad garden, but I can promise you that you're going to have a beautiful and very productive garden. There's nothing like having a wide variety of plants growing in your salad garden rather than just a few rows of the same type of plant again and again. Of course, you're welcome to ditch this plan and grow nothing but looseleaf lettuce in your bed. But this layout is how you step up your salad gardening game if you're ready!

Two Different Ways to Plant in Your Salad Garden

You're better off buying locally grown, organic plants from the nursery for some of your salad greens, while others will need to be planted from seed.

Plants to Grow from Seed

Generally speaking, it's the plants you might consider the most common salad plants that are best to grow from seeds right in your garden. Lettuce plants, spinach, arugula, and even mizuna do great from seed. You may notice that the backs of the seed packages for these plants will say that starting them indoors is not recommended, and that's because they don't transplant well. Fortunately for us, it's the very plants that don't like to be moved that grow super fast from seed.

I definitely recommend planting Aster plants from seed. Although you may see lettuces sold as starts at your local nursery or garden center, you likely won't have much luck successfully transplanting them into your salad garden. Even if they survive, you won't see as much growth as from the ones you plant directly by seed into your garden.

When you're shopping for seeds, look for heirloom, organic, and non-GMO. The quality of these tiny seeds can make all the difference. A great place to find seeds is your local nursery. They'll likely carry seeds that do well in your climate. If you're growing in a small container, look for seeds that are meant to grow close together; their seed packets will say things like “baby greens” or “container variety”. 

There's something very satisfying about watching plants grow from seed in the garden. If you're looking for a quick, easy, and inexpensive way to start your garden, go with direct seeding.

Plants to Buy from the Nursery

Unless you're up for starting some of the larger leafy greens indoors ahead of your growing season, it's best to just grab small plants, called plant starts, from your local nursery. Plants to buy include kale, collards, Swiss chard, chives, and any flowers you might want to add to your garden.

I encourage you to check local nurseries before you run to a big box store. Another great place to buy plant starts is your local farmers' market. Farmers often bring extra plants to the market along with their produce, so you just have to ask. You can feel sure those plants will be healthy and high quality.

Before you buy anything, first check that you're in the right season for that plant. Just because something's on the shelf, doesn't mean it's the optimal time to grow it. Refer back to the temperatures I mentioned for each growing season. You also want to check each plant for healthy-looking leaves. Go with younger plants over larger, more mature counterparts—they'll handle the move better. Buying plants is much more expensive than starting from seed, so make sure every penny counts.

Steps to Plant Up Your Salad Garden

Once you've got your salad garden all set up and ready to grow, you'll start with a little soil prep. Then you'll plant seedlings and plant starts, before finishing up with seeds. That way, you don't have to worry about disrupting any seeds hiding in the soil.

Grab your planting plan, and follow these steps to get those plants in the garden:

Step One: Prepare the Soil

Even if you've recently filled your container with soil, give the top 6 or so inches a quick turn. Basically, you just want to aerate the soil so that there are lots of little air pockets for all the delicate roots of your salad plants. You also want to lightly water the soil surface. If you have a drip irrigation system, let it run for a couple of minutes. Finally, use a hand rake or your hands to make the soil as even as possible—no big dips or mounds.

Step Two: Add Plants

Add any plants that will go in the border of your garden, like chives and flowers, first. This helps to frame out your space. Then add plants in the main rows.

For each plant, dig a hole as deep as the nursery pot and twice as wide. Gently backfill with soil once you've eased the plant from its pot and placed it in the planting hole. Keep my plant spacing recommendations in mind. Use some stakes and twine to plant in straight rows if your garden is large.

Water your plants in well. You'll want to monitor them for the next week as they adjust to their new home.

Step Three: Sow Seeds

Direct seeding is fast and easy.

As you’ll see when you open your first seed packet, lettuce seeds are super tiny. You'll need something to help you spread the seeds out as you plant. A couple of options are seed sorters, spice shakers, and condiment dispensers (the type that would typically hold ketchup or mustard). Anything with a small opening that will only allow a few seeds out at a time will do great. Another option is to mix your seeds with sand for better dispersal. The sand makes it easier to see where seeds have landed. I used this method when my children were little and I'd let them scatter lettuce seeds over our raised beds.

Another helpful tool to have on hand is something to help you space your seeds correctly, so a seed spacer, a measuring tape, or a ruler.

How to Sow Salad Seeds

You only want to plant a seed twice its width deep. Lettuce seeds are teeny tiny, so it's best to keep them right up by the surface. Most of the seeds for your salad garden are pretty small, so don't bury them any more than 1/4 inch deep. For spinach and arugula seeds, you can make shallow holes or just create a small trough in the soil.

Place your seeds every couple of inches (remember, the exact spacing will depend on your harvest goals). Leave your seeds uncovered until you're almost done. If you're planting in rows, make sure to stagger your rows to maximize space. Below, I'm using an old planting ruler to help me space lettuce seeds.

Once all your seeds are placed, gently press down on them with the palm of your hand to ensure they have good soil contact. Lightly cover them with soil.

Water the seeds in using the gentlest setting on your hose. Check the soil moisture daily. Salad seeds cannot dry out or they won't germinate. I also recommend using some planting tags to mark where you've sown seeds in a larger garden.

You'll likely notice some little green sprouts within just a couple of days of planting your seeds.

How to Keep Pests out of Your Salad Garden

Salad greens are like little plant magnets for creepy crawlies in your garden. The best and simplest way to protect your greens from garden pests is by covering them with inexpensive garden mesh. Read more about this organic pest solution here.

The idea is to use a lightweight material that allows water, sunlight, and air to reach your garden but keeps squirrels and insects out.

The best time to cover is the day you plant your garden. Seedlings and garden transplants are particularly vulnerable to pest pressure, and you don't want to cover once you've already spotted pests, only to trap the bugs underneath the mesh and give them an endless leaf buffet!

How to Cover Your Garden

To cover, you'll need some mesh fabric and landscape pins. If you're growing in a raised bed, you'll also need some hoops, which are easy to find at garden centers or online. For smaller beds, wooden stakes work great. For mesh fabric, I typically just use some tulle from the fabric store. You can buy something more sophisticated like agfabric or row covers, but tulle is inexpensive and easy to use. You can re-use it season after season.

Space the hoops every couple of feet along your garden, or place stakes in each corner of your container. This prevents the cover from touching your plants. Lay your material on top of the hoops or stakes, and then secure the edges with landscape pins.

How to Water Your Salad Garden

Salad greens are overall easy to tend, but watering is critical for success in the salad garden. Some varieties of lettuce are up to 96% water, so you can't be stingy with the watering can, okay?

Leafy green seeds must stay wet to germinate and grow. After that, they'll need about 1 inch of water per week. I recommend adding a simple drip irrigation system to deliver consistent water to your plants on a schedule, but there are other ways to water your garden.

Leafy greens love to be watered in the morning so they have all the resources they need to push through the warmth of the day. That also gives the soil time to dry out a little before evening so it doesn't welcome as many pests. Salad plants also prefer to have water directed straight to their roots because they don't like their leaves getting wet.

Finally, salad plants love consistency. There are some vegetable plants that like to get really wet and then get really dry. Lettuce plants are not those. Thanks to their shallow roots, they love consistent, even watering. This isn't rocket science, but I do want to say you'll increase how much you water when it's warmer outside and when there hasn't been much rain. You'll decrease how much you water when the temps drop and when there's been a lot of rainfall.

Signs of Trouble in Your Garden

If your soil surface looks dry, you have wilted leaves, or you have leaves that are turning yellow, something is not going well in your garden. If your soil surface is dry and your seeds have not germinated yet, you’re going to need more water. Wilted leaves are a sign that your plants need more water to thrive. Either increase the length of time you water or the frequency. Yellow leaves likely mean your plants are getting too much water. Don't water as much or as often.

The simplest way to see if your garden needs more water is to stick your finger in the soil down to the first joint. If the soil feels moist but not really wet, the soil moisture is perfect. If it's dry, obviously you need to add more water.

How to Handle Pest Issues in the Salad Garden

Beyond covering our garden as a great defense, there are ways to control pests and disease if any problems arise. Here are signs that you have issues in your salad garden:

• holes in the leaves
• rotting stems
• tiny insects on the underside of your leaves
• mold or mildew on the leaves
• stems disappearing altogether

Basically, anything that looks a bit abnormal is most likely a sign that something's going on. It's a great idea to check on your salad garden every day (while you're harvesting something for dinner!) so you can stay on top of issues before they spread.

The best defense is a great offense. Add nutrients to your soil to keep your plants as strong as possible. That way, they can fend off disease and pests. Monitor the moisture level in the soil. Gardens that are too wet or dry are a welcome sign to pests and disease. Prune and harvest regularly. Grow interrupters like chives with your salad plants. Whenever you start having issues, make sure you're checking all the boxes here.

Salad Garden Pest Treatment

If you're still having issues, here's your line of defense. First, give your plants a powerful spray with a hose. This is particularly effective for aphids and caterpillars. Second, remove any leaves that have holes or look discolored. Clean up the soil around your plants so that pests don't have anywhere to hide, like under dead leaves.

Next, you can spray some diluted Castile soap (my favorite is Dr. Bronner’s) on the leaves. The next options would be garlic barrier, Neem oil, Sluggo, and Monterey Bt. I’ve listed these in order of their strength. I recommend starting with garlic barrier and only graduating up if you need to, even though they're all considered organic. Make sure you dilute these treatments according to the directions, and use a spray bottle as your applicator. Avoid spraying before rain, which will just wash the product off your leaves.

Once you treat a plant, monitor it closely for the next week. If you don’t see pests reappear within 7 days, then you’ve likely handled the issue and can move on. Make sure to wait 3 to 5 days before you harvest and give those leaves a thorough wash before you eat them.

Should pests reappear, the last step would be to remove the affected plants.

Remember, every problem starts small. The best pest protection, as they say, is the gardener's shadow. It's when we neglect the garden that problems grow huge. Check on your garden daily, and I promise your issues will be few and far between.

How to Prune Plants in Your Salad Garden

Pruning can help you make the most of your garden. The first type of pruning is called thinning. When you thin your plants, you prevent problems because you, one, create more airflow around the plants, which decreases the chances your greens will get mildew or rot. Two, you make it harder to have a pest infestation. Thinning also allows the remaining plants to grow bigger, which means you get more production from your plants.

You'll need to thin if two or more plants pop up from seed too close together. The best time to thin is about 2 weeks after you sow seeds. Just use a clean pair of scissors or snips to cut extra seedlings at the soil level. Enjoy them as microgreens!

The next type of pruning is removing any discolored or pest-affected leaves from the plants. Don't let those stay because the plants waste energy trying to maintain them.

The last type of pruning is taking those older, outer leaves. This is the best type of pruning—it's also called harvesting! We'll look at how to harvest in a minute.

How to Fertilize Your Salad Garden Organically

The simplest way to add nutrients to the soil in your salad garden is just to add a layer of compost every couple of months. Compost, particularly mushroom compost, is really my go-to fertilizer. I would use this over any other type of system to help my garden stay healthy and strong.

Other great ways to add nutrients to your garden soil are earthworm castings, rock dust, bone meal, fish meal, and rabbit and chicken manures. You should be able to find all of these at your local garden center (and you don't need to buy all of them. Pick one or two).

These will keep your salad plants growing great—no MiracleGro needed.

How to Harvest Salad Greens

We've finally come to your first salad harvest! Take some clean scissors and a salad spinner with you to the garden to cut the best leaves you've ever tasted!

The Best Time to Harvest

All salad plants are best harvested in the early morning. They really are their sweetest after a full night's rest. One of my favorite rituals is having a cup of coffee and heading out with my salad spinner to do a little bit of cutting before the kids wake up.

Leaves are edible at each stage of growth, so you can enjoy your leaves when they're tiny microgreens or when they're really big. Smaller leaves are sweeter and softer, while larger leaves are crunchier.

How to Harvest Salad Greens

The best way to harvest most of the plants in your salad garden is to take the outside, lower leaves. This is called the cut-and-come-again method. The plants will push up new growth from their centers. This is true for everything from your smallest looseleaf lettuce plants to your tallest kale plants.

Harvest just a little bit from each plant. Not only does this ensure the plant will survive to produce more leaves for you, it keeps your garden looking its best.

You can harvest cabbage and head lettuces like iceberg and romaine the same way you harvest looseleaf—take the older, outer leaves and let the center keep growing. Once the head is completely formed, use a sharp knife or the edge of your scissors to cut the base of the plant. You can leave the roots in the soil so that you don't get dirt on the leaves of neighboring plants.

Make sure to soak the head of lettuce in some water afterward. This is to get rid of slugs or snails hiding in the interior leaves (the likelihood of pests between leaf layers increases exponentially with head lettuces, just FYI). Check before you eat so you don’t end up with some escargot in your salad.

Harvest only what you'll use immediately or freeze for later use. That just-cut taste is really what salad gardening is all about. You don't need to harvest a week's worth of lettuce when the plants are right outside your back door.

Give your leaves a good rinse and spin, and lunch is served!

How to Save Salad Greens

If you end up with more greens than you can enjoy today, you can store your leaves inside a sealed container in the fridge. Make sure the leaves are completely dry first.

How to Ensure a Continuous Harvest of Leafy Greens

Whenever there's an empty spot or row in your garden, you can add more seeds or plants for the current growing season or the upcoming growing season. Make sure the plants will have time to mature before the season ends if you're planting seeds.

Your small salad greens like lettuce will typically enjoy a 60- to 90-day lifespan in your garden. Around day 75, your plants might develop a strong center stalk. That's your sign that your plants are bolting, or preparing to go to seed. Harvest the last bit of leaves, and then remove the plants by cutting them at their base. (When lettuce plants bolt, you may notice a milky substance and a bitter taste. The leaves are still safe to eat if you don't mind the bitterness.)

You can sometimes extend the time that annual plants like spinach and lettuce will spend in your garden by using covers when the season changes. When the day-time temperatures go over 80°F, it’s a great time to put shade cloth over your salad garden. Shade cloth blocks some of the hard sunlight that causes cool season plants to bolt. Frost cloth can extend your growing season when it starts to get cold. Drape frost cloth over your garden when you're expecting frost or snow to give your plants more time to grow in the cooler months.

The lifespan of your plants can obviously be impacted by the climate that you live in and whether or not you decide to cover your garden when it gets cold or hot. Larger plants like mustards will typically stay at least 3 months, and kale, collards, and Swiss chard can remain for a long time.

When you come to the end of the season, it's time to remove plants that are looking tired or that won't do well in the coming season. Add some compost to your garden, and add seeds and plants that will love your current weather. Your goal is to never stop planting and harvesting until frost shuts your salad garden down for the winter. That's how you get homegrown salads of mixed greens for months on end.

How to Save Seeds from Your Salad Garden

Ideally, you'll try to delay your lettuce, arugula, and spinach plants going to seed for as long as possible. Provide shade on warm days, keep them well-watered, and prune the center stalk as it grows taller. Once a plant bolts, the flavor of the leaves will never be the same.

As your season comes to an end, you can allow a couple of your favorite plants to remain in the garden while they grow tall and start to flower. Let them do their thing, and then you can harvest their dried flower heads to save your own seeds.

Pass along some seeds you've collected to friends so that they can start their own salad gardens!

Time to Start Your Salad Garden

Growing leafy greens is one of the easiest ways to garden. And once you take your salad spinner out to the garden and cut your first organic leaves for a gourmet dinner salad, you'll be hooked! The flavors and textures alone will make it hard for you to ever go back to grocery-store salads.

Trust me, you're going to love growing your own garden-fresh salad greens and skipping by those boxes and bags of "sad salads" in the produce aisle for at least six months out of the year!

Cheers from my salad garden to yours!