Let Leaves Fall

Basswood December 2020

Someday, a very smart entrepreneur will start a lucrative business selling the fallen leaves of deciduous trees. In much the same way that folks realized that pine needles were not a waste product, they will realize the great value that fallen leaves have as mulch.  Here in Florida, the fallen leaves I often encounter are those of live oaks (Quercus virginiana). In my former landscape, I raked great piles of them every year in later winter (Live oaks are not truly evergreen no matter what you read) and then used them as mulch beneath my woodlands plantings, but live oak leaves are inferior to the leaves of many deciduous trees as they are thick and leathery and this slows down the rate in which they decompose. After all, leaf mulches are supposed to decompose. That's really what any good mulch does when not used as a trail or activity center.

When I first moved into my new home here in Holiday, there were no trees of any kind to provide the mulch I wanted and needed in my newly planted woodland. I was forced to rely on the leaf "litter" raked from other people's yards. It always astounds me that there are people who consider leaves to be litter and who pay people to rake it up, bag it, and then send it to a landfill like so much trash. The leaves raked for this purpose are often set alongside a curb for pick-up and I did for the first two years here. Things are finally changing now as I enter my third fall. My deciduous woodland is making its own mulch.

Even though my centerpiece canopy tree - an eastern basswood (Tilia americana), is far from mature, it is now large enough to shed a reasonable number of leaves, and unlike a live oak, they are thin and will decompose much more quickly. Nearly everything that I have planted in this area is equally deciduous and will contribute as well. The decomposing leaves will cool the surface of the soil and retard evaporation during times of water stress, they will return valuable nutrients to the soil for the plants to reabsorb, and they will feed large numbers of invertebrates that will also then feed birds and other wildlife. 

Mulches in planting areas are supposed to decompose. The ones that don't and only serve as window dressings should only be relegated to trails and activity centers. They have no place around plants. Mulches are not supposed to beautify things. Plants do that. They also are not supposed to last indefinitely. Landscape designs, like mine, produce self-mulching beds and this seems to me to be the best approach to an area planted with trees and shrubs. Someday, as I have written above, someone further north, will rake up all of the sugar maple leaves from the yards and vacant lots around them (and maybe get paid to do so), bag them in bundles and market them to those of us that need them. If that person is you, thank me later after your first million.

Comments

  1. MhaysDecember 29, 2020 at 10:10 AM

    A couple of years ago I hired someone to do some work for me. He blew all of the leaves that I was using for mulch out of one of the garden beds. I asked him to put the leaves back. He seemed quite surprised and remarked that no one had ever asked him to put leaves in their garden beds before. I thought, "well that's dumb." Unfortunately, my trees are all oaks.

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  2. JanelleHJuly 16, 2023 at 9:52 AM

    Mulching is easy work in my neighborhood, I just drive down the road and get my van packed full of bags of leaves and grass and then I pile them up into a pile and take from that throughout the year to mulch, but I am mainly using them to sheet mulch the turf out and under my bananas. I love the oak leaves as they decompose slower making them more useful as a cover when we go through long dry spells. When piled up they don't take long to decompose though.

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