Get Rid of Those Leftover Leaves Today!

You spent an entire weekend last fall raking bag after bag of leaves. You even missed the game. But the sacrifice was well worth it — your yard looked great!

Today, however, after all the snow has melted, you notice piles of leaves along fences, landscape borders, and your home ... not to mention scattered around your entire lawn. It’s almost as if all your hard work was for naught.

But as you know, it happens. Leaves continue blowing and find their way onto our property even when it seems every last leaf around us has fallen.

The easy solution is to just ignore them for now and mulch them up with a mower when your lawn is ready for its first cut, usually in April. It's an approach many homeowners take, but it usually comes at a price.

Here's why...

In early spring, your lawn is beginning to wake up after a long winter’s nap. In order for it to thrive, your lawn needs air, water, nutrients and sunlight.

If leaves are in the way, putting extra weight on your lawn, there’s a good chance these areas will struggle to get going — or even worse, die off due to smothering or disease.

That's why now is a good time to go outside and look at your fence lines, along landscape borders, and your lawn as a whole. If you see a buildup of leaves anywhere, which can ultimately cause thinning areas of grass or dead spots, it's best to take action now.

What exactly can you do?

It’s simple. Give your lawn a good, thorough raking. Not only will you rid your yard of potentially damaging leaves, but you’ll loosen and pull away excess thatch which can also block vital air, water and nutrients. (Tip: To prevent root damage, it’s best to rake when the soil is dry.)

Leaves make great natural mulch, so when you’re finished you can evenly spread a light layer over your garden beds. Otherwise you can add them to a compost pile, if you have one, or simply bag and leave them curbside for pickup.

The good news is, if you raked in fall, you should be able to get this done in a fraction of the time it took back then. The bad news is, if you didn’t get around to raking last fall, you might need to block out an entire weekend depending on how many leaves you have.

Either way, it’s best to get rid of leftover leaves early in the spring before they have a chance to do any significant damage to your lawn.

If you don’t have time or don’t want to waste an entire weekend doing it yourself, we can help. Contact us here for a free cost estimate.

Want even more tips to help make your lawn healthier this year? Click here.