Principia, Inc.

South Orange is a wonderful town. Our trees are are part of our identity. Our trees provide many benefits, however there is one considerable downside; the annual leaf clean up.

South Orange spends a whopping 480K collecting and disposing of leaves. New environmental regulations are expected to cause costs to triple starting in 2010.

Leaves are really an asset. Our current leaf management practices have turned an asset into a serious liability.
Leaves and other organic material including grass clippings increase soil quality and reduce water needs. South Orange’s notoriously tough soils are largely result of lack of organic material.

What we have been doing for the past decade at our home at 174 West Montrose Avenue:

1. Mow the leaves into the lawn.
2. Collect leaves from non-lawn services and save them for our summer composting. They are an important source of carbon, which is needed to balance the nitrogen heavy summer food and garden based compost material.
3. Leave leaves in shrub and perennial beds. Leaves are free mulch. Leave will be mostly rotted by Spring.  Leaves are an excellent and free early summer weed control.

For more, please see this very good material from http://www.southorange.org/Environment/LeafSolutionsFrameBottom.html

Garden Principia