While it may involve a small shift in your landscaping habits, the simple practice of leaving leaves in your yard rather than blowing them to the curb has many benefits for our community and the planet. Leaves are an important part of a healthy ecosystem, and leaving your leaves improves soil and tree health, supports butterflies, bees, birds, and other wildlife, and reduces flooding and pollution. It also saves you time and money while minimizing the need for loud leaf blowers! 

• Leaves are full of nutrients that fertilize the soil and support plant health.
• When the leaves drop under the tree, they decompose over 6 -12 months and become a natural fertilizer for your yard.
• Unlike turf grass and bare earth, leaves help control weeds and enrich the soil as they decay.
• Composting leaves (along with other brown materials like pine straw and twigs) can provide valuable nutrients for your yard and garden. You can learn more about composting here.

Support local wildlife.

• Leaves support biodiversity in your neighborhood by providing shelter for pollinators, butterflies, and other beneficial insects during the cold winter months. Make sure you leave your leaves until spring to really make a positive impact!
  • Native bees, fireflies, butterflies, and moths depend on leaves for cover during winter and emerge in the spring.
  • More leaves mean more pollinated flowers, lightning bugs, Luna moths, and butterflies.
• Beneficial insects that spend the winter under leaves support other animals and plants in our ecosystem.
  • Caterpillars and other insects are especially critical food for baby birds. A clutch of small baby birds such as Chickadees requires 6,000-9,000 caterpillars to grow to adulthood. [1]

Reduce flooding and improve water quality. 

• Leaves help soil retain moisture while reducing water runoff and flooding.
  • A bed of decomposing leaves acts like a sponge, soaking up water during heavy rains. The leaves slowly release water, keeping trees and other plants hydrated during a drought and reducing runoff during heavy rains.
  • The benefits of leaving leaves are even more significant in low-lying areas that are prone to flooding.  
  • Climate change means more flooding and drought, and leaving leaves can help reduce the intensity of these effects.
• Leaves blown into the street carry contaminants and nutrients down storm drains and into waterways. This can cause harmful algae blooms that diminish water quality. 

Avoid pollution, reduce waste, and mitigate climate change.

• Leaf collection requires large trucks that burn a lot of fuel and release considerable emissions.
  • During the 2023-2024 loose-leaf collection season, the Town of Chapel Hill's leaf machines and the dump trucks that pulled them consumed 6,236 gallons of diesel fuel and generated over 63 metric tons of CO2 emissions. [2]
• Gas-powered leaf blowers create an incredible amount of pollution, emitting nearly 300 times the amount of air pollutants as a pickup truck. [3]

Save time, effort, and money while avoiding loud leaf blowers.

• Leaves provide excellent fertilizer and mulch that is completely free.
• Take back the time, energy, and money you would have spent removing leaves.
• Preserve your ear health (and that of your neighbors) by avoiding the intense, high-decibel noise of leaf blowers. The volume of these machines reaches 90 decibels and can cause hearing damage after only two hours of exposure. [4]
• Put your feet up and relax, knowing that you're helping the environment, supporting local wildlife, and being a good neighbor.

What to Do with Your Leaves

It’s easy! Just skip loose leaf collection and try one of these alternative approaches to leaf management:

Leave your leaves where they fall. 

• Leaves provide valuable soil health and biodiversity benefits when left on the ground.  Sidewalks and driveways should be cleared as needed.

Move leaves under trees, around shrubs, or into perennial beds.

• Leaves are a great mulch for trees, shrubs, and garden beds. Raking is a great option and, electric leaf blowers create less noise and pollution than their conventional counterparts.

Compost your leaves to create fertilizer for your garden.

• To learn more about composting your leaves and other yard trimmings at home, you can visit this page on the Orange County Solid Waste Management website.

Use a mulching mower

• While using a mulching mower does not provide the same biodiversity benefits as the other strategies, it does still support healthy plants and soil. Sometimes a very thick layer of leaves can be too much for turf grass, and running a mulching mower (preferably electric) over the leaves to grind them up can be one approach to maintaining a healthy lawn.