What You Can Do With Leaves Now to Help Your Garden Next Summer – WNEP

Put it in a bag? Leave her? Composting? Tips on what to do with the fall leaves.

CLARKS SUMMIT, Pa. – Atlas Group landscapers are working to get all of their properties in order and make sure everything is in place before the winter months.

After the rainy and windy weekend that means we need to focus on clearing up the leaves this week. Workers from the Olyphant- based landscaping company clear the flowerbeds on this commercial property in Clarks Summit, collecting all the leaves and covering them with mulch to take to their garden for harvesting and processing into compost.

"So now is the perfect time of year to harvest all those leaves, plant material and grass clippings. And what we can do with it is start our compost piles for next year," said Andrew Kaminski, the company's operations manager. Atlas Group.

Landscapers say you can use your leaf pile as a layer of mulch to keep weeds out, or you can grind it up and mix it with grass clippings and twigs to create compost that eventually becomes fertilizer—a great way to add nutrients to your garden or a garden bed Materials you would otherwise throw away.

"Nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium create a lot of energy that these plants can recover once we get through the winter months," Kaminski said.

Kaminski says you should start building your leaf compost pile now. It begins to generate heat and break down the nutrients your plants and vegetables need to grow.

"Let that build up a little steam and start to break up the process. Then you'll probably be able to go through it every month and turn it over. Now just create and launch a stack so we can have it broken down into what it's made of," Kaminski said.

It's a relatively simple process, but composting the leaves requires patience, and turning the piles more often can speed up the process.

"Keep working on this pile because it takes a while to really establish itself in the compost. So make two separate piles and make sure that like Christmas tree farms, they will be planted as early as ten years from now. Just create a pile on one side and continue to make sure that you have piles that you can use in the future "You can use compost for your plants," explains Kaminski.

And before you know it, you'll be ready to take care of your garden again this spring.

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