maymo,
You will have to be more descriptive here. Are you composting in a barrell/compost bin or an open air compost pile? "I need to empty the barrel so that I can fill it up again." I don't really know what you are asking here?

Kevin

A barrel of wet leaves will get stinky in a hurry. Wouldn't a wheel borrow be easier to collect them in?

If you're using the barrel simply as a means of transport (yes, a wheelbarrow or tarp might be much easier), just dump it out near your small compost pile - as you collect other things to compost over the course of the season, add the leaves to them.

I'd rather deal with a "clean" pile on the ground than a mess in a barrel.

Thanks for responding, everyone. I used the barrel to transport because my wheelbarrow has a flat tire! The barrel is full but I still have more wet leaves to rake up. My bin is the small green doghouse shaped bin and it is full. I will add a lot of nitrogen to the bin to help balance the leaves. Oh, the barrel is actually a plastic garbage can with a hole in the bottom!

Okay, I'll ask point blank. Are you telling us you have no space anywhere in your yard to dump a barrel full of leaves? The ONLY available space is your already full doghouse shaped bin? No out of the way spot where they could be piled up to either dry out or become leaf mold?

If that is the case, you might want to consider not raking any more wet leaves out of the drainage ditch until you find another dump site. If they're not yet clogging or impeding the flow or interrupting the hydrological cycle in any way, I might be tempted to leave them. If it's an aesthetics issue and you just don't like the leaves being in there, create some space.

most intensive, most compact:
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dump them out on a tarp, spread them out to air dry, and shred them up via whatever method you prefer (lawnmower, leaf-shredder/blower, etc.)

least intensive, least compact:
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toss them out in an area of your yard that you're not currently cultivating for some other purpose (lawn or garden)

middle of the road approach:
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place them into paper "yard waste" bags and leave the bags open, somewhere out of the rain, until you can use them properly. The paper bags will go a long way towards sucking out the excess moisture while still keeping them in an orderly fashion. Eventually the bags will fail, but then they can be tossed in the compost with the leaves, once you're ready.

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I think trying to compost them, as is, in the garbage can is a recipe for anaerobic decomposition which is smellier than all get out and tends to attract every fly in a five mile radius. I ran into that problem last summer with a failed attempt at a 35-gallon garbage can composter I made by drilling out holes in a 1"x1" grid around the thing. I went back to just creating "free piles" in the back corner of the property where I could ensure at least a cubic yard's worth of material remained in each pile.

arjo reich also covered the spretrum of possible solutions. But it seems the OP is determined to want to deal with the leaves in the barrel which is full and can hold no more and cannot be dumped so, in effect, there's a stalemate here. Personal experience with getting one's face close to something gone anaerobic can be a valuable lesson - mere telling cannot convey the eye watering, throat closing stench. (But I am still curious to know if there might not be a square inch or two in the yard that could accept a "free" pile. I know some composters who'd move the car(s) out of the garage, put down tarps and fill it up.)

do you have any garden beds where you can just spread them out as mulch? I stopped composting leaves a few years ago because I was getting skinks and small lizards hiding in them and I didnt want the lizards ending up cooking in my compost bins (they were a bugger to catch and get out again)

so now I just rake up leaves wet or dry and put them straight in the garden beds, they make a great mulch and it's less effort than composting them so if you dont have room in your compost just spread them out around the garden. If you think you might be low on browns for your compost later, then drying them out and storing in bags as mentioned above is another option

trance...i'm sure the skinks and various other reptiles/amphibians would have dug their way out by the time the pile heated up again. I've been noticing salamanders near my piles lately (2nd year) and I don't mind so much because they help keep the insect populations under control. Do feel sorry for the first one I noticed as a very large salamander can look like a small copperhead in the wrong light.. :-/

hi arjo, I use contained bins for composting so I felt the lizards would get trapped in there and unable to get out again but it does get fairly hot inside especially when I add grass clippings. I wouldnt have worried with an open pile because like you said they would have just made their way out on their own. after having to catch them a few times from inside the bin I decided to just toss the leaves right into the garden beds as mulch so if there are any lizards in there they can just dig themselves under the leaf litter and carry on. The yellow bellied skinks were the main culprits because leaf litter is one of their favourite haunts

it did turn out to be a good thing though and I found that over the last few years the leaves have had a great effect on my sandy soil so I guess I have the lizards to thank for that :)

what a shame about the salamander :( so many lizards do look like small snakes

Maymo, as an aside, I reccommend a "no flat" or non-inflated kind of tire for your wheelbarrow. For whatever reasons, I discovered I have a great ability to ruin inflatable wheelbarrow tires and others tell me that I am not alone in this.