In the autumn we get an abundance of leaves dropping from deciduous trees. This free and valuable resource is ignored by most, slipped on by some and played with by anyone who remembers what fun kicking crunchy leaves about can be. Many gardeners spend hours raking them up to put out with their rubbish for the garbage collectors or in with their green waste for recycling. After all they make the garden look a mess and they "just seem to get everywhere". Don't they? Put too many in your compost heap and they just keep turning up even after months of being left for the composting bugs and beasties to do their job. 

If they are left alone in your garden over winter however the leaves just seem to gradually disappear. Where have they gone?

• Blown away in the wind, some may be.
• Gathered into a little pile in a quiet corner, yes some will be there too.
• Walked in through the front door and swept away, yes my vacuum gets them as well.
• Hidden under the hedge caught by low branches, yes there will be a few there as well.

Most of them however will eventually brake down into tiny pieces and be dragged down below the soil surface by the worms to feed all the bugs and beastiess found down there.

Take a walk in a deciduous wood and you'll notice the ground beneath your feet is a little spongy. You are walking upon hundreds of years of leaves that have dropped and composted away to leaf mould. It takes time for the process to be completed because of what the leaves are made of. However with patience you can create your own nutritious medium which can be mixed with your compost or used as a mulch. Plus it takes very little effort. All you need to do is collect them up, leave them in a hidden pile and forget about them for two years. When you come back you will have leaf mould. Magic.

If you don't want to risk them blowing around the garden after you have raked you can

either

• bag them up in a net bag or bin bag punched full of holes, the air needs to circulate around them, leave the bags in a hidden spot at the back of a border or under a hedge.

or

• put them in a compost bin which you use only for leaves

Give it a go next autumn and see what you can create. Got any questions then please ask me.