Sure the fall leaves can be pretty, but around this time I get overwhelmed with what to do with them all. It seems so silly to clean up nature and “toss” it away.
You may have ready my earlier post about My Love/Hate Relationship with the Fall Leaves. We have two acres of property, so that is a lot of leaves. Fortunately, most of it is wooded, so at the moment, there is only a few spots where the leaves have to be collected, along with any areas near those areas, to prevent leaves from blowing back where we don’t want them.
That earlier post pretty much says it all. Fall leaves can be fun, but what do you do when the jumping in them is all done?
Fall leaves don’t have to be trash. In fact, you can put them to work for you, which tends to make me feel better about doing all of that work of cleaning them up. Ha ha! You can get something back.
The way to do this is to look at the advantages of fall leaves. One main advantage is that they can be easily turned into valuable organic matter that can enhance the soil. Poor soil can be turned into loam, and the material can be used for everything from vegetable gardening and flower beds to winter mulch.
For gardening, shred the leaves first and then till them under the soil. An easy way to do this is to use a mulching mower to cut them up. Shredding the leaves first will help them break down sooner, so you won’t see a layer of leaves in the spring. By tilling or mixing the leaves under the soil, you will be able to more easily work the soil in the spring, since a layer of leaves sitting on top can keep the soil cold and wet. Although, if your leaves are really pulverized by this step, you really won’t need to till them under.
For the lawn, mulch the leaves with your mulching mower, but then leave them on top of the lawn. You aren’t going to work the ground of your lawn, anyway, and the pulverized leaves will provide rich nutrients. You can speed up decomposition with an application of nitrogen fertilizer.
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, creating a home in the Home Blog and caring for little ones in the Baby Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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