Science Says It’s OK To Leave Those Leaves On The Ground

I remember vividly how excited I was about yard work the first year I owned my house. New mower, new rake. My own lawn and leaves.

That thrill has pretty much faded. I don't really mind mowing every now and then, but raking leaves has lost its luster. If you're like me, you'll love this new article from Popular Science that says we really don't need to rake up all of those colored leaves every fall. And maybe even shouldn't!

It seems that rather than raking all of our leaves, stuffing them into plastic bags, then hauling them off to wherever we're supposed to haul them off to, we would do just as well for our yards and landfills by simply mulching them up and leaving them on our lawns over the winter.

According to the article by mulching instead of raking we activate a process called mineralization in which microbes consume the carbon stored in the leaves, casting aside nutrients like phosphorus and sulfur that actually fertilize our lawns. This is science, people. Can't argue with that.