My yard waste - no verde!

I am talking about grass clippings and leaves, along with weeds, dead annuals, etc etc.

When I embarked on my composting project, I didn't really realize that the largest amount of organic waste was from my yard. But because my office looks out into our street, I see everyone's huge piles of bags for the bulk pickup, including my own.

Having your yard waste hauled away to the dump is a bad idea. It takes up a huge amount of landfill space and quickly begins to ferment into methane, a very potent greenhouse gas.

So what can we do to make this a little easier on the environment? Move into an apartment of course. Yards are a bourgeois relic left over from ancient times. I have a huge one!

Joking aside, it is a pretty serious problem. Yard waste is a huge part of our waste stream. My half acre lot produces more than average so I felt compelled to do something.

My first thought was to just add all this to my new compost pile. I can gather it up, shred it (mulch it?) and throw it on the pile. But why? Why am I once again interrupting natures cycle? Let's talk leaves...

Mother Nature (Mom) fashioned an environment that takes care of itself. Leaves are Mom's fertilizer, mulch, bug food etc etc. When they drop from our deciduous trees we gather them up and put them in non-biodegradable bags...we are interrupting the cycle and adding some nasty plastic to the mix. (But those OPEC nations who sell us the petroleum to make those bags appreciate your business).

So if leaves are supposed to be on the ground why not just leave them? Well, our society doesn't appreciate the mess. Your neighbors will actually end up with your wind blown leaves. I have seen some yards, usually the xeriscape offenders, who just let the leaves lay. A pox on their home.

I have 14 deciduous trees. So here is what I do...

Bottom Line #1 - Have the lawn service...or you do it your-selfers, blow all the leaves from the beds into the grass and/or driveway. Then run over them a couple times with a non-bagging mower. Viola' mulched leaves! In my yard these small bits just filter into the grass. If I have too many I have them bag them and deposit them on my beds that usually take mulch! I have even taken my neighbors bags and dumped them in my driveway, had them mulch them up, and put them on my azalea beds...nothing is sweeter than stolen mulch!

So what I get is a natural fertilizer, moisture retention product and some shredded material for my compost pile just for fun. I buy, and have trucked, mulch and soil amendment to my property every year. Its expensive and the truck isn't very environmentally sound. This year I am hoping to do without most of that expense.

Bottom Line #2 - The leaves make a great looking and functional mulch that stays where it should. I no longer send any bags to the landfill. Once the grass starts growing we will (and always have) just mulch the cuttings into the yard. Any extra will be added to the compost pile.

Didn't cost me a dime by the way. Just had to educate the landscape crew a little bit. "No mas plastico baggarinos por favor." (I apologize to all my Spanish speaking readers).