Don’t throw all those freshly fallen leaves into your green waste cart for curbside pickup. Instead, create a leaf mold compost bin and let nature do the work of recycling those leaves into a nutrient rich soil amendment.

Producing leaf mold compost is easy to do, takes little time, and, except for the cost of a roll of chicken wire and a few stakes, is free.

Step 1: Locate a shady out of the way place to build your leaf mold compost bin.

Step 2: Shape a three (3’) foot by four (4’) foot circular bin from a roll of chicken (or similar type) wire. Overlap the ends of the wire roll and tie them together with twist ties, then evenly space three (3) to five (5) stakes around the bin to hold it firmly in place.

Step 3. Loosely fill the bin with leaves taking care not to compress or pack the leaves too heavily. You want air to circulate in the pile to promote aerobic decomposition.

Step 4. Lightly wet the pile as needed, taking care not to saturate the pile. You want to maintain the moisture of the pile at a level similar to a moist sponge.

Step 5. If you’re feeling ambitious, give the pile a turn once a month.

In just 12 to 24 months you’ll have a fantastic soil amendment that will improve the moisture holding capacity, drought tolerance, and structure of your soil.

It’s time to cover all of those open spaces in your garden and landscape with two inches of WM EarthCare™ Homegrown Compost.

Add spring color to open patches and raised beds by spreading a mix of wildflower seeds over the compost and water-in lightly. Winter rains will soon take over watering your seeds and help your wildflower garden flourish. The wildflowers make great cut flower bouquets as well as attract a variety of pollinators.

As an alternative to wildflowers, plant a green manure cover crop of clover, vetch, peas or other nitrogen-fixing legumes that you can turn under or mulch in spring. You’ll be building structure and adding essential nitrogen to the soil that will quickly be utilized by spring plantings.

Remember to always keep your soil covered.

It’s once again that time of year when we start to tidy up all those tired, spent plants that gave us their best with flowers and veggies throughout the summer.

Before you go crazy pulling wildly, save yourself time and money, and do your soil a favor too by simply cutting the above-ground portion of spent plants for composting, and leaving the root-balls to decompose in-place. Leaving the root-ball of spent plants to compost in-place promotes the development of soil structure, maintains pore space, holds moisture, and facilitates active soil biology.

Covering plant stubble with 1-2 inches of high quality compost or planting a cover crop will accelerate decomposition of the root-balls and add nutrients back to the soil for winter and spring planting.

So sharpen your shears and start clipping.

Seasonal high temperatures cause significant water loss through evaporation and transpiration from plants. Reserves of soil moisture are at their lowest, causing desiccation of roots and a decrease in soil organism reproduction.

Plant a fall cover crop or apply a thick layer (2-3 inches) of medium to coarse wood mulch to cover all bare ground, and extend the duration of irrigation to maintain moisture deep in the soil profile. Finally, adjust mowers to cut grass at 3 inches or higher.