We use dried leaves as dry matter for our home compost, for mulching soil in our pots on the terrace garden, and recently we have been making leaf mould out of dried leaves.
- Leaf mould is a method of making compost using just dried leaves. It can be added as mulch on top soil or in making soil mix for seedlings.
- It helps in water retention in the soil, in recycling of minerals stored in dried leaves and in improving soil structure.
- Leaf mould is a cold, slow, fungal decomposition, as opposed to quick, hot, bacterial decomposition in regular compost.
- We can make it in extremely simple ways, in a jute/gunny bag, or an earthen pot, or in a wire mesh setup, on a terrace, backyard or on land.
This year we made a wire mesh setup for making this compost, and got good results.
We started a batch of leaf mould in Feb this year in the wire mesh setup, and few weeks ago we harvested the compost.
The pile got reduced to ~20% of its initial volume.
We have been collecting many bags of dried leaves from our street, for this compost. Would love to collect more, as lots of lots of valuable dried leaves are simply mixed with other waste daily and taken away (to a very energy consuming path of being transported, segregated, and turned into compost/biogas or probably landing in a landfill).
Fall is coming soon, so let’s collect as many dried leaves as we can and let these mineral and carbon powerhouse do their thing for the soil, and for us.
Happy to learn more about this beautiful compost from those who have made it, and happy to answer any questions/feedback!
Detailed post here: How to make leaf mould compost on a terrace – Nirzaree's Blog
