Marvel of Four Seasons Lettuce

Lactuca Sativa

Story: This heirloom butterhead variety is first recorded in french gardens in the 1880s - making it a tried and tested favourite. We have grown it for several years on site and always find it to perform well - it is very cold hardy, holding solidly underneath snow and hard frosts while also being bolt resistant! So perfect for the changeable British seasons. The crisp, sweet leaves can be harvested singly or as whole heads - The only work is weeding, picking away dead or diseased leaves and making sure the lettuce doesn't fully dry out. The beautiful gradient of red to green ruffled leaves makes this variety striking in the kitchen and garden.

Seed saved by: Omved Gardens

When to sow:  February to November, indoors or direct once temperatures between 17 and 21 degrees celsius are likely. 

Requirements: Lettuce can be grown in varied conditions but high light, medium-richness soil and consistently moist but not wet soil are ideal for a long harvest and good growth. Keeping weeds down and pests away is crucial as damping off, competition and slugs are the main issues common in home gardens. 

When to harvest for food: Year round as needed either as whole heads or leaves 

When to harvest for seeds: Allow for the lettuce to fully mature and flower and for the seed heads to form and dry on the stalks. Once fully dry whole heads can be snipped off into brown paper bags to dry further or hung upside down over buckets.

Need to isolate: Lettuce primarily self pollinate but this varies across varieties and in different climatic conditions so we recommend only allowing one lettuce variety to flower per a garden to best guarantee keeping the seeds true to type if this is your goal.

Seed Saving: To save seed from lettuce a very early planting is best so that the seeds mature in dry, mid summer conditions - alternatively overwintering small plants is a useful way to get an early seed crop the following spring. The plants should be kept watered and fed to avoid bolting and be allowed to flower naturally, staking if and when needed, with dead leaves being removed and good air flow around the plants being maintained. The seeds mature gradually and sections of the dried heads may be removed as they are ready or in dry conditions/under cover they may be left to dry as whole plants in the ground. Once harvested the plants can be hung upside down to fully mature and the seeds threshed by hand before being cleaned using sieves and winnows (Always wear a mask when processing lettuce seed as the dust and chaff has a way of irritating your lungs quite badly!)

Number of plants to save seeds from: 5-10 minimum 

Pollination: Self and insect pollinated

How to send back seed: Please label all seed with variety, type, date and your name and contact. If you didn't get a chance to fill out our online data collection form, you can also send us a few lines about how it grew for you/flavour etc. Please aim to send back 1 tablespoon of dried seed or more so that we can continue to share with network members. Send to: The Seed Saving Network, Omved Gardens, 1 Townsend Yard, N6 5JF.

Please remember, if you’re an individual grower you can order up to 4 packets of seeds. If you order more than this, you will receive just four packs to begin with. This is to ensure we get plenty of data in return and to keep our stocks sustainable for years to come.* 

*Community groups, seed guardians and Experienced Growers can order larger quantities, please email us at info@seedsaving.network if this is the case.

If an item is out of stock we will send a close alternative.