5 Ways to Use Fall Leaves Instead of Bringing Them to the Dump
When it’s that time of year, this list is a great refresher on how you can take care of your fall leaves in a way that mimics nature.
Instead of hauling those leaves to the dump where they will decompose in a giant pile, adding methane greenhouse gases to the air in the process, you can:
Get a Greener Lawn
Save Money on Mulch
Make a Valuable Soil Amendment
Help a Gardener in Need
Create Habitat for Vital Insects
Get a Greener Lawn
Why?
Leaves have all kinds of good stuff or the soil that will result in a healthier lawn, BUT leaves will kill your lawn if you leave them matted over the grass.
By chopping up the leaves with the lawn mower, you can safely add the good stuff without smothering out the grass.
What?
Run your lawn mower over leaves falling on your lawn to chop them up and leave them to decompose on your lawn. Do this after managing the majority of the leaves in another manner, as this method works best when there are just enough leaves that the grass can be seen through them.
What are the benefits?
Adding organic matter into the soil where your grass grows will help it retain more water to get through the dry spells of summer. Leaves can add great organic matter to your lawn, and feed it in the spring as the leaves decompose.
That means less brown, more GREEN (less water, less fertilizing, less MONEY).
Where and When does this work?
This works best when there are just a few leaves left on your lawn.
This does NOT work if you have a very thick layer of leaves over your lawn, because the leaves will end up smothering the grass.
You should be able to see grass coming up between the fallen leaves before you start mowing. If you can’t see the grass, the leaves are too thick.
How do I do it?
Take care of the majority of your leaves using one of the other methods first.
Remove the bag from your mower to allow the clippings to fall on the lawn.
Mow your lawn as you normally would.
Save Money on Mulch
Why?
Mulch feeds the soil, keeps weeds down, and helps the soil retain moisture. And all of that equates to healthy, attractive plants.
Bark mulch does that too, however, the sourcing, manufacturing and bagging process used to ultimately get that bark mulch to your garden can have harmful environmental effects, and according to the Center for Agriculture Food and the Environment, bark mulch can end up contaminated with toxic substances. 1
Using leaves in place of bark mulch avoids all that, and it’s FREE :)
What?
Chop up leaves using your lawn mower or a leaf mulcher, and apply the chopped up leaves to your perennial garden beds as you would a bark mulch.
What are the benefits?
You save money while still providing your garden all of the benefits of mulch, and you avoid potentially contaminating your soil with the toxic substances that have been found in some bark mulch.
Poisoned soil has a harder time growing healthy plants, so again, keeping your soil healthy means your plants are more beautiful with less work on your part.
Where and When is this appropriate?
In garden beds where you have perennial plants established (or establishing) or where you plan on putting large (6” or taller) annual plants.
In relatively horizontal garden pathways where you want to keep weeds down. Due to the “slippery” factor, it’s not a good idea to use leaves on a sloped path.
Not reccommended around small annual plants.
How do I do it?
I highly recommend a leaf blower, vacuum & mulcher like this one for this method. It’s designed to vacuum up and shred leaves into a bag. It’s possible to do it without the leaf vacuum, but you’ll see how preferable it is to just get this $100 tool. (P.s. I don’t have any particular type or brand I can give a recommendation on. I just have my own, and it’s the only one I’ve personally used.)
Once you have the proper equipment, wait for a sunny day after a stretch of sunny days so the leaves are as dry as possible. Doing it at the proper time is the trickiest part of this task. If the leaves are wet or damp, it’s a right pain. In the right conditions though… magic!
When the leaves are dry, walk along with your leaf vacuum and suck up the leaves where they are the densest. Don’t bother trying to vacuum up leaves under the first layer, they are almost always wet. It’s easier to use the blower feature rather than the vacuum on damp leaves.
Fill up one bag at a time and empty the shredded leaves around your perennial plants. If you like to cut away dead flowers and foliage on those plants, now is a great time to do both. You can lay the “ugly” garden debris down first on the ground around the plant and then mulch over it to hide it.
Make a Valuable Soil Amendment
Why?
All that carbon the trees are dropping is super valuable, and your plants want to eat it!
Leaf mold is full of nutrients and organic matter, and will build healthy soil for a healthy garden. (and a healthy gardener ;)
What?
Pile your leaves in a 4’x4’ bin and wait for nature to do it’s thing and turn it into what we call leaf mold. Once the leaves have decomposed and turned black and crumbly, you can add it to your garden soil.
What are the benefits?
The microorganisms that live in the soil will be able to feast on all that organic matter. And when they are well-fed, your plants will be well-fed, and YOU will be able to enjoy a better, more bountiful garden.
You can save yourself from needing to buy in bags of organic matter and add your own home-made brand.
Where and When does this work?
Any place where you have the space for a 4’x4’ wire mesh bin
You can also add this brown material to balance out your kitchen scraps in your compost bin if you have one.
How do I do it?
Pick a location where you have at least 4’x4’ of space
Drive four stakes into the ground to form a square
Wrap chicken wire, or wire mesh fencing around the stakes to make the bin
Add leaves and other garden debris you typically clean up in the fall
Wait a year and then add it to your garden beds next fall before filling it up again.
Help out a Gardener in Need
Why?
If you don’t want to keep leaves on your property, you don’t feel like you have room or you just don’t like the look, you may be able to get some residual benefit by gifting those leaves to a neighbor who gardens, or even a farmer.
Farmers cannot get enough organic matter, and due to the “wide-open-feild-ness” of their gardens which allows for the sunlight they need to grow crops, they often don’t have an abundance of trees dropping leaves on their feilds.
What?
Rake and load your leaves as you normally would to take them to the dump, but instead of bringing them to the dump, bring them to a neighbor or nearby farmer.
Aim to keep the leaves as close to you as possible. When humans move stuff around, we tend to move around “invasive species.” So the smaller distance we move biological stuff when possible, the better.
What are the benefits?
If gifting your leaves to a neighbor, you will get some of the same benefits you would from keeping them on your property. Plus, your gardening neighbor may thank you with some of the produce they use those leaves to grow ;)
Where and When does this work?
Anywhere where you have a neighbor who gardens or a farmer who would like to use leaves in any of the ways listed in this article.
How do I do it?
Think of anyone you know who has a big garden, or even anyone with a small garden, but not a lot of trees nearby. Let them know you recently heard that leaves can be a resource for gardeners and would they like any of yours. If they don’t know yet how leaves can help them garden, show them this blog.
Offer to dump them in a spot they designate. Ask them to show you ahead of time where you can dump the leaves, or come up with a marker you can use to communicate this.
Load them as you would to bring them to the dump. You’ll still benefit from a shorter trip, not to mention the residual benefits of keeping those leaves and the habitat they provide close to home.
Create Habitat for Vital Insects
Why?
Insects are disappearing. We NEED insects if we are going to continue surviving here on planet earth. I know buggos aren’t everyone’s favorite (they’re not mine either), but they’re … you know … the bottom of the food chain. Insects are foundational.
Leaves are absolutely critical infrastructure insects need to survive the winter. IMAGINE if every year right as it’s about to get cold… an army of aliens laser beamed up all of our homes and buildings. A lot of us would die. That is basically what fall clean up is to these very important parts of our ecosystem.
What?
Rake or blow leaves to the outer edges of your property to the base of your treeline.
What are the benefits?
Healthier trees = fewer branches to pick up
First and foremost, when you blow leaves to the outer edge of your property, you will have less maintenance thinning brush around your trees, because the leaves will act as a partial weed barrier. Instead of removing them, let them insulate and feed the trees around your property.
Trees need the leaf matter they produce to decay around their roots. It’s their natural process. Taking your leaves from your lawn and putting them at the base of trees around your property instead of removing them entirely will lead to healthier trees.
Healthy trees drop fewer branches, and are more resilient to disease, meaning you are significantly lowering your chances of needing to remove a tree in the future. Just by leaving the leaves!
Fewer pests ruining your plants
Your garden will have fewer pests ruining your plants, because the leaf litter will allow good insects (remember, 97% of insects are good guys) to survive the winter and keep the bad populations in check.
When you work to eliminate all bug life in your garden (as is sometimes reccommended by outdated sources of gardening advice) you are setting the ecosystem in your garden back to square one. Square one being the initial invitation for destructive pests to come dine on your plants without fear of predators.
When you allow both the pests and the predators to overwinter in your leaf litter, you are giving the whole ecosystem of your garden a jump start in spring, because the beneficial insects are already right there!
For more info on beneficial insects, check out this other blog post I wrote on the subject.
Where and When does this work?
If you have a wooded area of your property (along the property line usually) or you have any “unmanicured” or “wild” area of your property where you are not trying to grow grass or garden plants.
Along the bottom of a fence line, on both sides, where you want to keep weeds down.
Not ideal for garden beds where you want to grow annuals, and leaves can even smother out perennials if not chopped up, so it’s best to chop up any leaves you want to use around plants.
How do I do it?
Decide where the grass ends and the “woods” begins by creating a line with fallen branches, or use an existing stonewall, pavers, or any kind of “marker”. Physically defining this line makes a big difference aesthetically and practically as it denotes where to mow.
Rake or blow the leaves off of the lawn starting from the middle and blowing out in a circle toward the line you created.
Don’t aim to cover the line with leaves, rather “color inside the lines” by making sure all the leaves are over the line.
This is the easiest way to take care of your leaves. Easier than a brush pile all in one location and it creates a better bug habitat
I hope this has shed some light on what a truly valuable resource fall leaves can be! Good luck cleaning up your leaves this fall, and don’t forget to jump in a pile ;)
Cheers,
Beth
1.https://nwdistrict.ifas.ufl.edu/hort/2019/05/17/is-colored-mulch-bad-for-the-environment/
