OT: Why do we rake leaves?

[scoop22]

i spent lots of hours raking as a young girl. i would always say i am moving to a house with no leaves. this wasn't really a requirement but our yard does not have a tree on it.. no raking here. the leaves from the neighbors come over but oh well. this is one chore i hated.

good luck! sometimes the leaves seem like they never go away

[trales]

Many types of leaves are acidic, as they break down, they acidify the soil, combined with acid rain and nitrogen deposition can lead to a dead lawn. You can pile oak leaves under azealas and rhododendron bushes will give them the right amount of acid to bloom more in the spring.

[bubbaray]

Another reason -- mold. If you have allergies to mold, or you have plants in your garden that are susceptible to mold, you need to rake them up asap.

[DrSally]

i spent lots of hours raking as a young girl. i would always say i am moving to a house with no leaves. this wasn't really a requirement but our yard does not have a tree on it.. no raking here. the leaves from the neighbors come over but oh well. this is one chore i hated.

good luck! sometimes the leaves seem like they never go away

I remember spending a lot of time raking as a girl too. When we were in CT with an acre of wooded land, we actually hired it out b/c it was so much and we had to do it so many times. They would blow it onto a gianormous tarp and haul it over the edge of our lot into a gully.

[elaineandmichaelsmommy]

We just wait until the tree is done and then run them over with the lawn mower. I know. lazy,lazy,lazy us. I remember being a young girl and people burning leaf pile in the gutters. I miss the smell of that actually. But I figure the mulch is good for the grass.

[Kyras mom]

A leaf sucking truck? Never heard of such a thing. Do you just rake the leaves to the curb and the truck vacuums them away? Sounds cool.