Green incised lettuce has a finely divided leaf margin that gives a distinctive texture in a pack. It is positioned by breeders towards high-density production and mechanised harvesting, which is a different commercial proposition from a wholehead sold by the piece.
What the crop needs
The crop is short-cycle and hydroponic. The claim attached to the type is that it suits close spacing and automatic harvest, and both of those are system decisions that have to be designed for: close spacing changes the climate inside the canopy, and automated harvest sets requirements for uniformity and for the growing system’s geometry.
What the greenhouse has to do
Incised lettuce is aimed at density and at automated harvest, and automation is a building decision before it is a machine purchase. Gutter or bench layout, aisle width, floor tolerance and the route to the pack area all have to suit the harvester, and retrofitting a house that was laid out for hand cutting is expensive.
Density then carries the economics. Plants per square metre set the water system and the light requirement, and a machine cuts a whole batch on one pass, so it is the least even part of the floor that decides the grade. Uniform transmission, uniform air movement and uniform water delivery are the specification the harvest method depends on.
DutchGreenhouses® designs the structure, climate, screening and irrigation around the lettuce type, its system and the local climate, so cycles turn at the head quality the market grades on. Get in touch to plan a lettuce greenhouse.
Other lettuce varieties and the systems behind them
Butterhead lettuce
Soft, loosely wrapped leaves, and the type least tolerant of handling.
Greenleaf / Batavia lettuce
A firmer, more robust head than butterhead, and it travels better.
Romaine lettuce
The upright head, and the tipburn risk that comes with it.
Hydroponics
Substrate growing with drip supply and drain recirculation.
Climate
Heating, cooling, humidity control and carbon dioxide dosing.
Cut by machine, eaten within days
Incised lettuce is a green leaf with a deeply cut margin, grown for texture in a pack and eaten raw like every other salad leaf. Its content is the family’s; its production model is not.
The type is bred for close spacing and machine harvest, so a whole block is cut in a single pass and enters the chain within the same hour. Volume of that kind usually feeds washing, mixing and bagging, and a cut, washed leaf keeps for less time than a whole head. The divided margins that give the type its texture are also open edges, and open edges brown.
Short distances are what make the model work. With the house near the line that processes it, a machine-cut batch is washed, mixed and sealed the same day and still reaches the shelf with life left in it. A long haul spends that window before the bag is even closed.
Nutrition facts
Lettuce, green leaf, raw
Per 100 g
- Energy
- 15 kcal
- Fat
- 0.15 g
- Carbohydrate
- 2.87 g
- Sugars
- 0.78 g
- Fiber
- 1.3 g
- Protein
- 1.36 g
- Sodium
- 28 mg
- Potassium
- 194 mg
- Vitamin C
- 9.2 mg
Green incised lettuce, asked and answered
Is head weight or head count the right target?
Lettuce is sold by the head, so the count reaching grade in a year decides revenue. A heavier head grown more slowly can earn less than a lighter head on a shorter cycle.
Does the cultivar matter more than the type?
For head mass, density tolerance and tipburn risk, yes. Those are cultivar properties, which is why a lettuce project is planned around a named cultivar rather than around the type alone.
What causes tipburn?
Calcium not reaching the fastest-growing leaf margins, driven by transpiration and root pressure rather than by supply. Climate control addresses it; adding calcium to the solution generally does not.
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