I'm constantly jumping up and down about using leaves - the best mulch, as far as I'm concerned (and like you said, it's F-R-E-E!)

Gravel. Seriously. But, only with certain plants. My new gravel garden held moisture, never needed watering this summer in our drought and 100 degree days (um, weeks... hope not months!).

The gravel garden is basically an extension of the gravel on our driveway and guest parking area onto the surrounding beds (and addition of a small hardscape element). Rosemary, buddleia, crepe myrtle, Japanese iris (yep), monarda (indeed), hollies, yucca, lavender, perennial heliotrope.

It's been surprise to me - a good surprise! Didn't expect the results.

Cameron

Here is a link that might be useful: A Funny Thing Happened in the Gravel Garden

I love leaves too. One can never have to many.

In general, I'm a huge fan of this type of mulch, too. This is how mother nature mulches the forest. But there are a few caveats about them. Walnut leaves contain juglone. Too many oak leaves temporarily kidnap the nitrogen from the soil, use lots of grass with them.

When I lived in OH, I would put all of my leaves on the gardens, up to 18" (ash, maple, cottonwood - unchipped/not packed down) in some spots. The abundant worms would have eaten them all by the time the plants started emerging. If you have some bagged grass, adding that to the leaves is even better (brown + green = compost.)

My son keeps asking ~ why in the world I collect dry fall leaves as Winter coats for my Hydrangea Divas, only to re-bag them ($1.75/bag) for *Curb-It* collection & turn around to run to HD for bags of Cedar Mulch? Like you said they would be great mulch & free as you pointed out (free if I don't mentally charge for leaves-collecting-labor ~ I could have 2 more new plants! yay)

Thanks aachenelf!!!

I've collected fallen leaves & kept in a ring of chicken wire staked in the ground as well as kept them in plastic bags. Once the bag is about 1/2 the size the leaves have composted into leaf mold - great for starting seeds in pots or the top few inches for direct sowing. One year I grew potatoes in the ring with nasturtiums & peas climbing up the wire.

Last year, I loaded up heavy bags of wet leaves from a landscaper stuffing my Suburban full. More work to unload them at home onto the lawn, shred with the lawn mower with catcher, & put back into the bags. I was pleased with the huge haul of maple leaves, but decided it was really too much work to do again even with my son doing the mowing & bagging. Plus, the lawn didn't look so good for awhile -- though this spring the lawn looked better than ever.

I'd like to try out a leaf blower/vacuum shredder to see if it's easier and worth the expense & trouble. They have mixed reviews, so I'm not sure what one is best. After all I don't need 20 bags of leaves every year!

I have a woodland garden with natives only. Every fall the whole thing gets buried in at least a foot of leaves, sometimes more if I have them. By spring they've packed down quite a bit, but are still deep. I love watching everything emerging from that sea of brown leaves. Things struggle a bit, but everything manages to make it. By this time of the year all those leaves are gone - totally decomposed - and the soil in that garden is some of the best I have.

corrine - The leaves I got from my friend were sucked up with one of those blower/shredder things. I don't know what kind it was, but the texture of the leaves was fantastic. I don't know if I would buy one, but as long as someone else wants to shred their leaves and give them to me, what the heck. I'll take all I can get.

Kevin

I mulch with shredded leaves every fall and I LOVE it. I like the lawn mower better than the leaf blower/vacuum method. They are a finer mulch and easier as the leaf blower gets heavy when the bag gets full. I also steal neighbor's bags for my compost pile. I never seem to have enough leaves.

A friend of mine lives in a city where there are lots of Old and mature trees, The residents are required to use these tall paper waste bags when they rake up their leaves. The city comes around and picks the bags up and take them back to their processing plant and shredds them to use around city parks and city gardens. She has neighbors that save their bags for her or she will go around gathering those bags up before the truck gets there. She invested in her own leaf shredder and that is all she uses for mulch. Some times she may collect as many as 20 plus bags. You don't see many weeds among her flowers and any flower she looks at grows. At our former house, we used to have a man that had an old Station Wagon come around and collect the grass clippings for his garden to keep the weeds down. He'd load that SW full of bags of grass. I wondered why all his car windows were down. You know how grass smells once it is setting for a while.

I have used shredded leaves as mulch for years. Can't get enough even with a few neighbors giving me theirs.

Used a lawn mower to shred the leaves then got a leaf blower/vacuum shredder and love it. Worth every penny to me as it is much easier and quicker than the lawn mower.

Where i live there are many tall fir trees and during winter storms branches get broken off. I sit and watch; smiling as I see all that free stuff falling from the sky. In early spring, I fire up the shredder (electric) and 'harvest' the gift from Father Winter.

The wild grasses here get chopped down before they can set any seed and I mulch the strawberries with the straw.

About 3 years ago a friend was cleaning up their mother's place to sell it and delivered many bags of trimmings which were piled out back. I'm now harvesting piles of brown gold (compost)

I never turn down 'free'

I love fall leaves as mulch. I get plenty where I am and use the leaf blower/vac to shred them. So easy to use and they shred very well too. If I want them really shredded any more I can just dump the leaves out of the bag and resuck them up. The more you do this the finer the leaves.
I use them as mulch, and also use the rest for my compost piles. I don't waste any.
I also don't rake out the leaves come spring. Just leave them in place and let them decompose on the spot.