It’s that time of the year again in Nashville, when looking out your window leads to images of a ragged-looking lawn covered in the dead and dying, instead of the nice, tidy, and trim emerald grass you are used to seeing. Yes, we are living in the days of autumn, when the leaves are falling in full force, leading to weekends spent cleaning up waste instead of doing literally anything else. This might not be a problem when you have a small area to clean up, but even that can take hours. Now imagine how much time it will take to cover a large area, and that is just dealing with the leaves. There has to be an easier way to makes things look nice! Luckily for you, there is. We here at the Parke Company are professionals at making life easier, because if there is one thing we learned from our youth, it is to “work smarter, not harder.” With that in mind, here are some ways to ease your mind about the amount of yard work the fall season brings.
How to Clean Up Fall Leaves
Mowing Down the Competition
When it comes to dealing with leaves, the gold standard has always been the simple, humble rake, and while there are some positives to raking, like the amount of time you get to spend outside, breathing the fresh cool air, it can be a real pain. Plus you have to bag the leaves up afterwards, and you end up spilling a lot of them on the ground and need to do the whole thing all over again (although we here at the Parke Company are happy to remove the leaf bags for you). There is a better way however, and that is to use a mower. Now I know that sounds like it would make more of a mess, but if you get a mower with a mulch bag on it, you can save the mulch and use it again as a nutrient-rich additive when it comes time to plant things in the spring.
Getting High
The important thing to remember when mowing with a mulch bag is to make sure the blades are not too low to the ground. At this point in the year the grass has stopped growing, so cutting it too close to the ground can cause irreparable damage to the grass underneath. Set the blades on the mower to the highest setting so you know you’re only going to mow up the leaves. If you are concerned about the risks, you might want to look into the landscaping services offered by the Parke Company, although you should do it quickly, as this is a busy time of the year for us.
We understand that raking leaves, either into those heavy duty bags or into a big pile for jumping into, is one of those time-honored fall traditions. We are big believers in honoring traditions, but this is one of those times when you need to think about what is best for you and your lawn. Mowing and mulching is definitely the more efficient option, but raking is not bad either, as it still gets the leaves up and away.