As fall heads toward winter, autumn leaves cover lawns, sidewalks and landscape beds. Most homeowners rake them into piles and stuff them into 30-gallon plastic bags, effectively throwing away a beneficial and free resource for the garden. Leaves make excellent compost, the foundation of a beautiful garden bed.

There are simple ways to compost with leaves:

¢ Trench composting is what it sounds like: You dig a trench or trenches at least 8 to 10 inches wide and 1 foot deep. Fill the trenches with shredded leaves. Add some manure or a cup of fertilizer to speed the decomposition. Pile the dirt you dug from the trench on top of the leaves, and next season you’ll have a raised garden bed.

¢ A variation on trench composting is walkway composting. Lay a thick layer of leaves, shredded or not, between the rows of a raised garden bed. You have created a walkway that will gradually decompose. As it compacts, add more leaves. In a matter of months, the leaves (if shredded) will have decomposed enough to mix into your garden soil.

¢ You also can try what’s called sheet composting. Simply till a few inches of leaves into the garden bed in fall. Add a bit of fertilizer. By spring, the leaves will have decomposed nicely. If you have lots of leaves, repeat the process periodically during fall and winter. Sheet composting would be especially useful for homeowners with a tiller but no method of shredding leaves.