Wait, being lazy is good for the environment? I’m in.
If humans did literally nothing ever at all, the world would be teeming with a lot more life.
The question in my mind is more about whether the local environment serves us without sacrificing too much of the natural environment, and a high maintenance cosmetic lawn doesn’t serve me or nature at all.
They’re called leaves because you’re supposed to LEAVE THEM!
My wife has gotten used to this but some of the neighbors still judge a bit. Then again, we’re the house with the hummingbirds and tons of other nesting migratory birds as well as the house with lightning bugs
See, I did the whole “leave the leaves” thing last year and it completely killed the vegetation under my big maple tree. It was kind of nice since it gave me a chance to replace that grass with clover, but now I don’t want the clover to die.
It’s been a year and we still have maple leaves from last year that haven’t decomposed. Not quite sure what I’m supposed to do.
If you have a backyard full of trees/shade, they will never dry.
Leave them over winter which is when they provide key shelter/food. Winter is killing the grass anyway, and then mow them in the spring to shred them and help them decompose. We mow ours in june and they were gone a month later.
It’s one big maple in the front yard, and it only killed the grass in a circle under the thickest part of the canopy. Come spring we had a brown circle that only dandelions were growing in with grass doing just fine outside the circle.
I do think part of the problem could have been the extremely wet fall & winter we had. Felt like the rain never stopped.
Leaving all of them is in itself a human impact on the environment, you wouldnt find a single maple in a forest, but you also wouldnt find a field in a forest. if youre concerned about bugs I’d still be removing at least some leaves
really theyre a resource I’d collect them for compost heaps
It’s like fighting my instinct. I want to clean it up but I want birds to have bugs to eat in the spring. So I just compromise and do it in a way that pleases no one.
Leaving the leaves on the ground but painting them to match the grass. It’s a real pain in the ass to get the shading right.
