Dealing With Leaves in Your Yard

Many people underestimate the impact that leaves can have on your yard or garden, for better or for worse. You might be tempted to just leave them scattered all across the ground, but there are certain tricks that might make them more useful – and ways to avoid them causing problems.

EWM Dumpster Rental proudly serves customers in Bushkill Township, Pennsylvania in Northampton County with affordable prices on all types of dumpster rentals.

Remember that handling leaves is quite easy, but there can be a lot of them. The more trees your local area has, the more leaves that will fall all at once, so do not underestimate how much of a mess they can create.

Do: Know Local Laws

As strange as it might sound, most cities (or greater communities) have laws on how you can dispose of leaves. This can be important if you are planning to get rid of them, especially if you recently moved to the area.

For example, you might not be allowed to use certain disposal methods or dump leaves in public places, even if those places would normally have leaves anyway. Sweeping leaves into the road is a good example – many places do not allow it since it can interfere with nearby drivers.

Don’t: Sweep Into The Street

While it is already unlawful to brush leaves into the road in many places, you are usually not allowed to push them into a regular street anyway. Leaves that end up in water drains can cause blockages and have even been known to consume oxygen in bodies of water so that fish suffocate.

The type of street can matter a lot – a back alley is usually fine, but an open stretch of road that sees a lot of traffic might not be. There are more reliable ways to dispose of the leaves anyway, so use this as a last resort – if there is no other way to get them out of your garden.

Do: Use Them As Mulch

Mulch is a very powerful tool for growing new sections of grass or recently planted flowerbeds. Since most leaves contain a lot of plant extract, they can be a free, easy-to-access resource that can help your garden grow more consistently in tough weather.

You can also combine this leaf mulch with other types if you need to. A lot of people will choose to use leaves as replacement mulch or as an emergency option if a plant is struggling to grow during a cold spell. This is a great cost-saving measure for hobbyist gardeners, too.

Don’t: Rake For No Reason

Some people get into the habit of raking leaves to make a space look ‘tidy’ or to keep their garden clear. While this can definitely have its benefits, you are also potentially harming your garden and making it harder for problematic spots to regrow. 

When leaves decompose, their nutrients can allow plants and grass to grow slightly more reliably. Unlike the mulch, you do not need to do anything specific – just keep track of the least healthy areas and keep that spot covered with leaves as long as you can. The better growth is worth the wait.

Do: Compost Leaves

Composing your leaves is another great option and is an easy disposal method that you can do in only a few minutes. If you have an existing compost bin or pile, throw your leaves onto that and let them break down over time. This is a hassle-free and easy-to-manage solution at smaller scales.

Even if you have far too many leaves to compost, you can still dedicate some of them to your compost pile. They are perfect for padding out a nearly-full compost bin, and doing this can help reduce the pile that you will need to dispose of later on.

Don’t: Keep Leaves on Solid Surfaces

Decomposing leaves might help grass, but they can hurt hard surfaces like driveways and paths. This also extends to your car – you do not want to keep it covered with leaves for too long. This can cause damage to certain materials or even leave marks on the surface, ones that you will have to clean later.

It is often a good idea to sweep leaves off into the grass since that is where they can have the most noticeable benefits. There are very few reasons to leave big piles on your driveway, and moving the leaves should not be too hard since theyare very light and easy to brush around.

Do: Consider Renting a Dumpster

A dumpster can be a great way to dispose of a huge amount of leaves. Consider renting from a company like EWM Dumpster Rental and offering it to your entire neighborhood – there could be space to hold the leaves of a dozen gardens, maybe even more.

This is ideal for any situation where you have far too many leaves to ignore. In places with lots of trees, the leaves can stack up so high that it becomes difficult to create compost heaps or keep them under control, but a dumpster allows for quick and hassle-free disposal.

Don’t: Burn Them

Burning leaves is not only illegal in many places, but it damages the environment. Even without considering those facts, the smoke can also be very harmful, and there is always a chance that the flames spread further than you expect.

Leaf-burning is never a good idea and barely ever has a use, even if you want to get rid of the leaves completely: it does not offer any real benefit to you or your community. A dumpster rental and half an hour of picking up leaves have the same result with none of the downsides.