How to manage leaves in a large yard?

[pdqdl]

I do commercial grounds maintenance, and that includes leaf cleanup.

We try to mulch all the leaves into a powder, dispersing the residue on the lawn as much as possible. Excess leaf piles might get blown or thrown into garden areas, used as mulch or compost, and lastly... hauled off. As has been mentioned previously, just keep mowing regularly, and chew up the leaves before they become a big problem.

The trees suck nutrients out of the soil to make those leaves. When you carry the leaves away, you are depriving the soil of the return of those nutrients when the leaves decompose. Mulching the leaves and returning them to the soil is the natural way of disposal.

Leaves left unmulched, however, generally kill off the grass. They form a wet, air-resistant blanket that chokes out the grass and leaves bare ground. Mulch those leaves, however, and they decompose into the spaces between the turfgrass blades, and you have happy grass with less work.

I haven't hauled a single leaf off my yard in over 25 years, and I have plenty of large trees. The grass is doing pretty well, considering I haven't fertilized or over-seeded at all for over 10 years. The back yard is starting to look pretty thin, but I'm blaming the 5 ducks for that problem.

 

[Oldtoolsnewproblems]

I don't try to maintain any amount of lawn, but you still gotta manage your leaves to keep pests at bay, so important things are:
cut any grass you have before the leaves fall, makes them way easier to move
backpack blower MINIMUM, nothing handheld is enough for any real size area
a trailer can be abig help to move things long distances, i have a small 15 cu ft one i tow behind my ride on, works great
you can just leave a ton in place by running it over with the mower after you clear the heavy out

 

[Bubster]

I watch some of the commercial lawn guys here use a covered trailer with a big vacuum . They blow them into several piles and just go along with the trailer sucking them up. Im sure they are chopped up some too. I cut all my trees a few years ago for safety reasons and dont have that problem.

 

[EchoRomeoCharlie]

#1 reduce the amount of lawn you have to upkeep...plant native prairie grasses...sometimes you can get paid for this or at least get seed for free by your government programs...look into it
#2 Mulch leaves often as they're falling...it's actually very good free fertilizer for your lawn.
#3 If you're in the country, blow them into the ditch by the road and burn them

 

[AnniesDad]

Leaves are natures way of protecting a trees critical root zone with insulation from soil heating and cooling to quick. Leaves are food for the trees as the return into soil. Leaves are homes for many beneficial insects and soil critters.
Not certain who or what company sold people on “leafs are bad” but they certainly did a good job.

 

[computeruser]

Let it all grow up into woods and let the leaves kill the grass. Blow the leaves in a small area that you want to keep grass in to an area just beside the lawn that you are going to keep.

Large lawns are a waste of a lot of things, including time.

Perfect response. Have a grassy area to sit in, or to throw a football, or whatever. But screw of grass is a waste of time, money, and effort.

 

[EchoRomeoCharlie]

Leaves are natures way of protecting a trees critical root zone with insulation from soil heating and cooling to quick. Leaves are food for the trees as the return into soil. Leaves are homes for many beneficial insects and soil critters.
Not certain who or what company sold people on “leafs are bad” but they certainly did a good job.

Not a company. People like having turf yards because it's much nicer for kids to play in and adults to recreate in and maintain. Plus it looks nice. Leaf litter kills turf yards as it covers it up. People don't want leaves to kill their turf so they remove them. Pretty simple.

Trees live just fine with a turf yard beneath and no leaf litter as witnessed by turf yards being commonplace for over half a century.

 

[AnniesDad]

 

[Seachaser]

Blow, mow, burn or combination. We have a ten acre orchard and use all three. We burn the limbs pretty often. Keeps you busy. Pecan trees have lots of limbs and leaves

 

[AnniesDad]

Ok. So we won’t talk about what’s good for trees but what’s good for turf. Personally I think it’s highly overrated but that’s me. I’ve got to much of it. Cut back on mowing turf about 30% this year and let er go. Just the biodiversity that showed up was incredible besides the 3 gallons of gas I saved per mowing. But that’s another story.
There have been more than a couple of scientific study’s done on this topic since around 1994 when leaves were banned from dumps.
The results were pretty interesting in mulched leaves were actually better for lawns than bare lawns. In fact maple leaves helped reduce or even eliminate broad leaf weeds like dandelions. Soil fertility was improved and the grass stay “purdy”.
This is just one of the study’s and they mulched ankle deep leaves for a few years.
There’s a few more science type papers out there as well.
I’m lucky in that I have a very diverse collection of leaves and needles and I never “collect” 1. Grind em and go!

https://archive.lib.msu.edu/tic/mitgc/article/199866b.pdf

 

[AnniesDad]

Blow, mow, burn or combination. We have a ten acre orchard and use all three. We burn the limbs pretty often. Keeps you busy. Pecan trees have lots of limbs and leaves

When you say orchard, what kind or just pecans?

 

[AnniesDad]

9lbs. You might be burning a bunch o $.

 

[AnniesDad]

When you say orchard, what kind or just pecans?

Dang. I’m to far up nort for pecans but man the shells sound awesome. Pretty versatile. I love cooking with wood fire and may have to go find some shells for smoking.
Cool. Thanks for the reply. I learned something.

 

[Captain Bruce]

I don't try to maintain any amount of lawn, but you still gotta manage your leaves to keep pests at bay, so important things are:
cut any grass you have before the leaves fall, makes them way easier to move
backpack blower MINIMUM, nothing handheld is enough for any real size area
a trailer can be abig help to move things long distances, i have a small 15 cu ft one i tow behind my ride on, works great
you can just leave a ton in place by running it over with the mower after you clear the heavy out

Its just us, our equipment, and the annual leave clean-up. Shredding first yields a product with a vast market.......check into organic farners near you........either way, what you do to enjoy your day, is not maintenance. Its FUN!

 

[alanbaker]

I rake the leaves to mulch the garlic. 6-8" of leaves little to no weeding. I plant 6000 - 8000 cloves. Leaves are also put on beds where root crops were harvested. I also take bagged leaves from our dump, I mean transfer station and use them in the chicken pen and horse stalls.

 

[pdqdl]

In fact maple leaves helped reduce or even eliminate broad leaf weeds like dandelions.

I haven't heard that.
The anthocyanin pigments in Maple trees has been shown to be a phytotoxin that inhibits other tree's saplings. I would guess that it would be equally inhibitory to other broadleaf plants.

 

[Oletrapper]

Let it all grow up into woods and let the leaves kill the grass. Blow the leaves in a small area that you want to keep grass in to an area just beside the lawn that you are going to keep.

Large lawns are a waste of a lot of things, including time.

Sorry Del, I must respectfully disagree. I really like my lawn. Especially the 7 Tee. OT
Happy Thanksgiving.

 

[benz66]

Ok. So we won’t talk about what’s good for trees but what’s good for turf. Personally I think it’s highly overrated but that’s me. I’ve got to much of it. Cut back on mowing turf about 30% this year and let er go. Just the biodiversity that showed up was incredible besides the 3 gallons of gas I saved per mowing. But that’s another story.
There have been more than a couple of scientific study’s done on this topic since around 1994 when leaves were banned from dumps.
The results were pretty interesting in mulched leaves were actually better for lawns than bare lawns. In fact maple leaves helped reduce or even eliminate broad leaf weeds like dandelions. Soil fertility was improved and the grass stay “purdy”.
This is just one of the study’s and they mulched ankle deep leaves for a few years.
There’s a few more science type papers out there as well.
I’m lucky in that I have a very diverse collection of leaves and needles and I never “collect” 1. Grind em and go!

https://archive.lib.msu.edu/tic/mitgc/article/199866b.pdf

Yes, maple leaves are great for lawns. High tannin leaves like sycamore and walnut are not.

Please, take your leaf blower and burn it, or scrap it. Leaf blowers only redistribute the problem, and ruin your ears.

Leaves are part of the natural cycles of life. I've had two very different lawns for most of my life. The house I built was on an acre and a half of "oak savannah" I arranged the house driveway and garage so that I didn't need to mow. I had a wonderful lawn of wildflowers in the shaded part. Nothing was more than knee high. In late October or November I would mow it once, (tractor and 6' rotary mower) if it needed it or not, or burn it. The leaves in the driveway were a nuisance, but I'd rake them and throw them over the bank.

For more years, I had to live in town. The small yard had 2 sycamore trees. One was the largest I have ever seen. I found out it was being watered by a field tile system from long ago. It had leaves bigger than a dinner plate, and the tannins killed nearly everything. There was also a mature maple, two apples and a large black locust, and a birch tree. At first we raked and burned. that was ok. Then the city banned burning. I tried mowing and mulching, but the tannins overwhelmed the yard. I bought a chipper/grinder. we raked the leaves into windrows and then fed them into the grinder, but disposing of the ground leaves was a problem. I used them for mulch everywhere I could. After the kids were grown, this system was untenable. I bought a mower with a bag. In big leaf fall times (sycamores drop leaves and sticks year round) I would get 15-20 bags from the 40x50 back yard. In the end, I built a 6x6x16' miniature double corn crib as a mulch pile, with the theory that I could turn the mulch from one side to the other. The first fall, even with grinding up all the leaves I could run over with the lawnmower; by snowfall, both sides were full of leaves. But it was a good system. Each spring I emptied out the compost on the bottom into the garden. Sometimes in the fall I put compost in the garden. I still mulched around the house foundation with grass clippings.

There are big leaf baggers to pull behind a riding mower, and some can be dumped from the mower seat. For a large lawn, i'd use that system. Right now I have a neighbor whose lawn service blows all his leaves into my yard. I can't stand the constant whining of the blowers, and putting his leaves in my yard is annoying. Mow, bag, rake, compost, mulch as appropriate for your lawn. Consider plantings and or garden that reduce the raked and mowed area. Landscape Architect Jim Sinatra was an early adopter of this. He planted his front yard in 1971, and by now the shrubs are mature, and it has not needed to be mowed or leaves raked for 50 years. (You will find Jim Sinatra retired from RMIT in Australia now) By the time I sold the house with the sycamore trees, I had the front yard planted with hosts and shrubs so that all I mowed/raked was the strip between the street and the sidewalk.

You could also get goats. (Schedule F deductions) The offspring can be sold for good money. There are lots of good ways to deal with leaves other than rearranging them with an earsplitting noisemaker.

 

[jolj]

Rake & compost