With the leaves falling and autumn kicking in. It is very easy to get annoyed with the litter of golden leaves that form in small mounds on the pathways and roads.

Over the last few years I have been using nature’s refuse to fill the dozen or so raised beds on the plot. Whilst is not particularly full of nutrients, it does have it’s uses. I use it as filler so I don’t have to spend a small fortune on multi-purpose compost as the levels of raised beds decrease over time. Leaves are dumped to decay over the autumn and winter months, and then in the spring, I cover with multipurpose compost.

Leaves are gathered up Dad and put into gardening bags. Dragged down to the plot, these the fill the beds along with any other organic material such as grass cuttings. I have in past, put thirteen or so bags into a one tonne builders bag. This over the course of eight months has then decayed down into a soil like consistency. As mentioned above, there is very little nutritional value. Leaf mold is therefore best used to improve the structure of soil and bulk it out.

One year I used one builders bag in a raised bed that was planted up with marrows and courgettes. I can safely say, that the plants grew exponentially, because of the decaying material.