OT: leaf clean up in the upper Midwest; how many hours am I looking at?

[wc1934]

As mentioned, leaf blower, tarp and bagging - ugh - cuts into riding time for sure. If purchasing a blower it is the CFM's that matter, not MPH.

[Hellgate]

Our yardman bags as a part of his service. I happily pay his very reasonable bill.

[Ralph]

Originally Posted by Ken Robb

FWIW the payment to our HOA covers ALL exterior maintenance and it is the one we are HAPPIEST writing.

That's our next move. In the long run it's cheaper also. I imagine your HOA reserves for the big expenditures.

[batman1425]

Def. mulching. Bagging (both grass and leaves) is a major cause of nitrogen depletion in soil, which you then have to spend $$$ on fertilizations to correct. Lawns can be surprisingly well balanced if you don't get in the way of the nutrient cycling too much. There are certain scenarios where bagging is better, but in general, it helps to return that biomass to the soil.

Also - don't skimp on the mowing in the fall. Your lawn will do better long term with shorter cuts before the winter months to avoid snow mold.

[Ken Robb]

Originally Posted by Ralph

That's our next move. In the long run it's cheaper also. I imagine your HOA reserves for the big expenditures.

YES, CA. law requires regular analysis of reserves/budgets and our limits annual dues increases to 10% max without a vote of all owners. We also buy Earthquake insurance. Many other HOAs do not. Leslie and I also buy Earthquake insurance for our home's interior and belongings which are not covered by the HOA policy.

Some of the best local Realtors can probably give you a general idea of how well the HOAs work in various complexes in any area you are considering. I guess you will be able or required to review the HOA rules and any covenants/ restrictions on usage prior to closing.

[Ralph]

Believe it or not....Here in Central Florida my yard is covered in live oak trees. And leaves, leaves, leaves in my yard. I just mow them in. Maybe once or twice a year....too many to mow and I have to rake. I would suggest you use the mower/mulcher as much as possible (even if grass/weeds not in growing season in your area), and only rake what you can't mow over. Here...we mow about all year anyway.

[benb]

Just say NO to bagging the leaves and trucking them off somewhere else to compost. That's a ton of extra work. In my yard it's probably 10X the work to rake & bag vs mowing + compost.

We just mow them up with the bagging mower.. they get chopped up and reduce in size like crazy.

Then we dump them in a compost heap. Leaves & Grass reduce in volume by > 50% in a few days. They compost down to nothing over the course of the next year and then can be spread back into the lawn.

We used to do the big paper bags... it'd take like 50 bags to clean up our leaves. I have a Subaru Outback, with the back seats folded down I'd maybe get 10 bags in and then have to drive to the town compost facility.

We have one area of our yard which can't be seen and doesn't get enough sun to grow grass so that's where we compost. Our leaf situation is bad. We don't have giant trees in our yard.. but the entire property is ringed by 75+ ft high maple trees & pine trees just on the other side of our fence.. they dump massive amounts of material into our yard. Ours is so much leaf material we can't just leave it and let it cover the grass.

[madsciencenow]

Originally Posted by teleguy57

Actually, I do, but it can take 4-5 passes with the mulching mower, and there's sometimes a deep enough row of mulched leaf material that I'll rake it up and take it t to the recycling center. ut still much better than raking the leaves as the material is so much more compact in volume.

We're in a suburban town where we're responsible for our own leaves; when I lived in the city itself the municipality picked up leaves/mulch/yard waste from the curb in the fall.

FWIW, we have a large yard with 6 mature ash, 4 big birch (including one that towers over the second story of our house) 3 maples and a locust. Of course, each drops their leaves at a different time The locust leaves have those darn stalks that don't mulch all that well.

The biggest pain actually is getting the dropped leaves out of all the landscaped beds around the house and yard. I rake (or sometime blow) the leaves from the beds into the yard and mow them into mulch.

Ah, wait. The biggest pain is keeping the gutters cleared of all the dropped leaves. Thinking it may be time to spend money on one of those leaf/gutter systems, so if anyone has a recommendation for brand would love to hear it.

Saw somewhere recently about how much landfill space is taken up by raked leaves; it was a scary number.

edit: just saw the OP's question about how often. I'm a bit anal about it, but when the grass is growing fast or in the fall I'm cutting/muching twice a week to keep ahead of things. It does cut into my riding time!

The gutter guards get mucked up with leaves and pine needles and in my experience do more harm than good by rendering the gutter useless so the water rolls over the edge of gutter and rots your eave. The guards do keep leaves out of the downspout but you have to be hyper vigilant about keeping the top unobstructed.


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[SlowPokePete]

I've got a half acre mostly lawn with maples and oaks around the perimeter.

We get a ton of leaves in the Fall and our town requires them to be brown bagged to be picked up, vs the vacuum method used by other municipalities.

There's NO WAY I'm bagging all those leaves.

I have a leaf pile in one corner of my yard...at peak it's 6-10 feet high.

By spring it's just a mound again.

SPP

[Seramount]

altho my city provides each resident with a 96-gallon bin for compostables that is collected weekly, I only use it for tree limbs.

grass, leaves are handled via mulching mower, kitchen scraps go to a compost pile.

[Buzz]

https://www.billygoat.com/na/en_us/s...ck-blower.html

Get yourself a wheeled leaf blower. This is how we did it when I was a kid. I had a good business especially around the corner from our house in a neighborhood which had really big tree filled lawns. two teenage kids could easily do the work of a whole crew of guys with rakes in 1/4 of the time.even wet matted leafs would move. You just need a friend with a rake to lift an edge of leafs and away it would go. Also would pick up sections of grass if not careful. We blew them onto a tarp and dragged them down to the street curb. There would be long mounds running in the street curb that the city would then come by and suck up with a giant vacuum into dump trucks. Made a lot of money that way and the same in the winter with a really good snowblower.

[zmudshark]

Mowing is easier than raking. Mulching is easier than bagging.

Life long Michgander, except for recent Winters, because no one needs that, if it can be avoided.

[Mikej]

I just let them blow around- clean up is futile.

[wildboar]

benb said what I was gonna say, tho better. Find/use an old mower you don't mind getting dusty, then pile up the choppin's and watch them all disintegrate next spring. Cut the grass low before they fall, then mow them using a higher setting.

[GonaSovereign]

Originally Posted by saab2000

Whatever you do, please spare your neighbors the agony of leaf blowers. They ought to be criminalized, and I'm only half kidding. They are incredibly annoying to anyone within two blocks.

Mulch. Mulch and then mulch until your lawn can't take it anymore. Then use actual rakes because the soil will appreciate it. It's called work for a reason and leaf blowers may blow away a couple leaves, but your neighbors will hate you and the soil won't know anything ever happened if it hasn't been toiled by a rake. Greener grass is the reward of actual raking.

Look at your municipal rules. You're probably looking at 10-20 hours of work, tops. It's part of living in the upper Midwest with mature hardwoods.

Quoting this post because it is the correct answer. Half acre or less: get a rake. Get some bags. Rake and bag.

You'll be outside, you'll build a bit of muscle tone, and you're not belching single stroke engine garbage into the air.