I raked my leaves; why didn’t you?

To all of you homeowners who don’t get your leaves up in the fall, I have news for you. It is winter now, and they are blowing in the yards of everybody who raked up their leaves weeks ago.

I spent three weekends in a row with a sick son and a 73-year-old mother, who has a bad back, out in my yard raking up 34 bags of leaves. Then my husband came home and mowed up the rest Thanksgiving weekend.

After the recent windy days, my yard looks like I didn’t bother. Guess what? These are not my leaves, but the leaves of everyone who didn’t bother to pick theirs up. And in my neighborhood there are a lot of you.

Pick your own leaves up. Your neighbors would appreciate it.

Jennie Sindak
Overland Park

Comments

[Kate]

Tina, we aerate our lawn every fall, so your suggestion would fit into the routine. It’s never made much sense to me to throw away so much organic material and then turn around and pay for lawn chemicals. Last year I talked my husband into getting a rain barrel. I’m hoping this year I’ll finagle a small compost bin. Baby steps. Thanks for taking the time to answer!

[TinaMcG]

"Tina, serious question - do you compost them first, or just leave them on the lawn? And if you leave them in place, doesn't it kill the grass? I would rather use the leaves than have them hauled away, but I'm not sure how to do it."

Good questions, Kate. Here's what you do:

1. Rake up the bulk of them, leaving about a single layer on the lawn. Then run over them with the mower. They do need to be chewed up to keep from matting down and encouraging fungal diseases.

2. If you core aerate the lawn before the leaves fall, a lot of the shredded leaf material will fall into the cores, which is ideal. It puts the organic material under the soil surface, the only way to do that without tilling up the lawn. The shredded leaves that remain on top of the lawn will make contact with the soil and decompose, improving the soil.

3. For the bulk of your leaves, you can do two things. First, you can chew them up with a leaf vacuum and lightly work them into the soil surface around your bedding plants and shrubs. This stuff is GOLD for the soil.

4. To use whole leaves (which shouldn't include the really big ones like red oak), you can heap a thick layer (as much as 12") around shrubs, perennials and young trees. This layer will shrink to almost nothing by early summer. If you create any new planting beds or berms in the fall, load them up with as many leaves as you can. This will save you money and labor in adding expensive bags of compost or other soil amendments.

5. Last year, we had about 30 bags of leaves that didn't get spread before winter. they stayed in the black plastic bags until May. They were just fine. The ones on top were whole and dry, and the ones at the bottom had composted into the most beautiful leaf mold you can imagine, and this is what I used on my most prized plants.

Some homeowners insist on pristine lawns with no blades out of place, zero weeds and no sign of a leaf when winter comes. Ignore these people. They know nothing about what it takes to grow things.

Of course, some of those piled up leaves might blow into your neighbors' yards. As long as you don't live next door to Jenny or 'Mianotkia', you should be fine.

[solomon]

miafarrow,

Sounds like you have need for a community activist, but look towards an asinine solution.

[Kate]

Tina, serious question - do you compost them first, or just leave them on the lawn? And if you leave them in place, doesn't it kill the grass? I would rather use the leaves than have them hauled away, but I'm not sure how to do it.

[TinaMcG]

Wahhh wahhh wahhh -- you hauled those 34 bags of leaves to the curb for the city haul away didn't you? If you did, then YOU are the bad guy here, not your neighbors.

I've studied college horticulture for years, and soil science is my strong suit. If you have any complaints about MO/KS soil, blame yourself, because leaves are the single best thing you can add to the soil to make it usable for gardening and turf care. You know all those products you hear about on the radio, the ones that promise to break up clay? They don't work. The only thing that works is organic matter, and leaves or grass clippings are the most plentiful kind of organic material you'll find in your garden. I'll spare you the biological explanation of how decomposing leaves break up clay, but they do. Google "soil food web" for a clue.

We live in south JoCo where the soil is horrendous silty clay. Our topsoil was removed when the previous owners built the house, and we've had to buy back about $8000 worth of it to get a landscape started. Now we're adding leaves, which we import from friends in Prairie Village and Overland Park, because there are so few trees here.

We have three acres in desperate need of soil amendments now, so if you still have those 34 bags of leaves, I'll take 'em. And next year, blow them into your planting beds or chew them up onto the lawn. Our landfills don't need them, and I wish the municipalities would stop taking them.

[Kate]

Poor Mrs. Sindak. I’ll bet her neighbors are the kind who inch up close to your bumper at stop lights, too.

[mianotkia]

I am with you Jennie! The nimrod on the corner of my cul de sac lets his leaves lie all winter. For the past three years I have had to clean the out of my drive and my garage and have them hauled away in the Spring. This year I am saving them to deposit in his garage at the first chance, and I will dare him to say one word.

[Casady]

She sure seems like a peach, doesn't she One Sided? God help Mr. Sindak.

Pick and choose your battles, I say.

[T. Hanson]

Just at night go to your neighbor's houses that did not rake and cut down the trees. Problem solved for the next 10 years.

[Marctnts]

"I spent three weekends in a row with a sick son and a 73-year-old mother, who has a bad back, out in my yard raking up 34 bags of leaves."

Sounds like someone has misplaced priorities, or cares way too much what others think of her yard.

[kcstar_is_one_sided]

I'm guessing Jennie is popular on her block