Forget breaking a sweat doing yardwork this fall – leave the leaves alone.
Leaf litter on your lawn or garden is a win-win-win, giving you your weekend back, wildlife a place to hunker down in your yard for the winter, and compost to provide nutrients for your grass and plants.
This low-maintenance fall cleanup is “perfect for the ‘lazy’ gardener, because what we’re talking about is not doing much at all,” says WWF-Canada community action specialist Jarmila Becka Lee.
People often think it’s necessary to rake leaves and remove them.
“But, actually, you can leave them,” Lee says. If you don’t want leaves on your lawn, “You can rake them over to your garden beds, and what that does is it creates habitat for wildlife, but it also acts as mulch and fertilizer for your garden. So, it’s actually providing a service to you, as well.”
Best practice for a leaf layer on your garden is about 3-5 inches, which creates a moisture barrier for the soil.
“You still have plants and trees that are active at this time of year, until the ground freezes, they’re still drawing that moisture and growing – the roots are still growing,” Lee explains. “It helps keep your plants happy.”
As the leaves break down, they create fertilizer, which helps skip another step come spring as soil absorbs the nutrients from the compost.
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Leaving the leaves also helps create habitat for wildlife, “everything from insects to amphibians to small mammals,” said Lee. “Something that is positive not just during winter months, but into spring.” Overwintering insects then provide food for birds in early spring.
If you’re lucky enough to have a big old tree on your property that sheds more leaves than you can fill your garden beds with, excess leaves can be chopped with a lawnmower and left on the lawn to decompose, which fertilizes your yard, or composted either by yourself or via a yard-waste program.
The City of Toronto also offers a yard waste program, picked up every other week on garbage collection day from mid-March to mid-December. (According to the City’s website, yard waste can also be dropped off at one of the drop-off depots year-round.)
Yard waste collected by the city is turned into compost, some of which is available to the public – for free. Although, the city also recommends leaving leaves until spring.
“Native pollinator species in Toronto need plant litter such as fallen leaves and dead hollow stems to nest and survive the cold winter months,” Toronto’s website states.
However, for safety, always ensure leaves are removed from walkways and sidewalks as they can become slippery in rain or snowy conditions.
Fit for a queen
While there are plenty of insects that overwinter in urban yard habitats, pollinators such as bees and butterflies are especially at-risk species and will make their winter homes in various locations around your yard.
WWF-Canada community action specialist Jarmila Becka Lee says places like “stems of many perennial plants, which are hollow, and some that have a spongy inner pith, those are really perfect for overwintering bee species.”
While we all know honeybees live in a group, native bees in Ontario are solitary and will winter either in an adult stage or pupal stage.
Bumblebees, which live close to, or under the ground, also need a place to shack up for the winter.
“Queen bumblebees burrow into the top layer of the soil, but that leaf litter then provides a nice insulating blanket for them over the winter and helps them survive so that when they come out they can start a new colony in the spring,” Lee said.
She also added a butterfly called the morning cloak, one of the first butterflies of spring, will winter as an adult in leaf litter.
If you hope to attract some feathered friends to your yard over the winter, leaving seed heads on your flowers can entice visitors. Flowers with large seed heads, such as cone flowers, can be left standing to provide food for birds. New England asters, goldenrod, and other common perennials can all be left standing throughout the winter to provide food for birds.