Snag the 40 bags & toss the leavesa on all of your garden beds, until the leaves are approx 12" thick. They will rot down quite alot over the winter. If yopur husband complains, blame it on me!I never bothered making leaf mold.

Oh, I'm behind! I only gotten 21 and I also was thinking man, this might be enough. I'm going to try the weed wacker in a plastic garbage can to shred them down.

Thanks for the post! I'll have more courage to go get another 21 tomorrow! Heh, I'll have to take the truck.

The guy from tv (Paul James) suggests adding bloodmeal (w/water & poke holes in bag) to the bags of leafs to have it turn more into compost than leaf mold. Never tried it before, but it'd probably help to accelerate the decomp process :)
All the Best,
Tree

I spread mine out on the ground and not only do I make leaf mold, but I got TONS and TONS of worm castings to go with it.

:)

If you add some form of Nitrogen, blood meal is one, your have compost not leaf mold. Leaf mold is just as Ma Nature works on the leaves, the leaves spread out (not piled up) and left to be digested as the soil bacteria find the time and energy.

I have a wire mesh basket made of stucco wire (galvanized perforated metal,small openings)about 5' dia. Leaves get piled in,some whole some shredded,whatever.Usually somewhat damp/wet,they compact too.
Just forget they are there,around here you'll have some mould on the bottom in a year.Adding any "green" or nitrogen will make compost,and leaf mould is distinctly different.

Can you tell me the pros and cons of leaf mold vs compost?

See this

Here is a link that might be useful: compostguide.com

We've got a forest. Can I just run out back and shovel up some forest litter? It is moldy.

Leave the forest leaf mold where it is. The forest needs it. If other people are silly enough to get rid of their perfectly good leaves, however, they're fair game.

I'm with you Mommyandme, all this compost bin, leaf mold, shred it, pile it, turn it, mess with it stuff is just to much work.
Put it out in sheets over your beds and let it all happen right there in the garden. I've been doing it that way for 30 years. It's simple and it simply works.

Because the nutrients in both compost and leaf mold are not very soluble there is no way to test to see which has more nutrients, but simply because of the way compost is made versus how leaf mold is made gives you an idea that compost probably has many more. Anyone that tells you to take leaves, pile them up, and often add some N is really telling you to compost, not make leaf mold. Leaf mold is just leaves left where they fall to be digested as the bacteria and/or fungi get around to it.

Primary difference between leaf mold and compost.
Compost will probably look more like rather organic dirt.
Leaf mold is more of a perfect mulch material. Which is better primarily depends on what you need them for as they are both great things to have.

Chances are a compost pile with the primary brown being leaves will have both compost and leaf mold unless it was turned a lot.

If you don't need the leaves to mix with high nitrogen items in your compost pile you might more quickly use them on the garden beds where they will become leaf mold if they stay moist enough. If you want to save them for future leaf mold use then keeping them moist somehow and hopefully the will be leaf mold when you are ready to use them.

I wish I had more leaves on hand.

I know making leaf compost would be quicker but I believe that for what I want the LM is better. As tclynx mentioned, I believe it will be a better mulching product, which is what I want. And I like its superior water retention. As worms work it into the beds, I believe it will really improve the soil and help reduce watering needs. And before that happens, it can act as a weed suppressant as mulch.

Some of you mentioned just covering the beds with leaves and letting them decompose there. I'm skeptical about how well this would work for me. This past spring, I laid down about a 6 inch layer of leaves in places that I wanted to suppress weeds. I then covered that with cardboard, hoping to keep the leaves in place and moister. Where there wasn't cardboard, the leaves are still there. (I haven't checked the leaves under the cardboard). I can tell that there is decomposition going on, but it's so slow that it will be another year before they are gone-- if then. Wouldn't it be even slower over the winter? I will say, though, they did a good job of keeping the weeds down.

My leaf mold was full of slugs -- of course they are a problem here in the PNW. Perhaps it wasn't old enough? It was only after finding this forum that I attacked the pile of leaves the gardeners had left in the bushes and also discovered a lot of slugs had wintered over in them.

I see . . . I'm learning the details of an important distinction - thanks! All the Best, Tree

Slugs love wood chip and leaf mulch. If slugs and snails are a problem for your plants, you might want to leave a board laying on the ground near your plants. Check under the board regularly and drop the slugs/snails into soapy water.

How well shredded leaves will get digested in, or on, your soil depends on how god a Soil Food Web you have. I know people that have shredded leaf mulches on their planting beds for 3 or more years now (same leaves) because they continue to poison the soil with plant killers and synthetic fertilizers and have nothing alive in their soils. Digging in does not find a single earthworm, an indication of a healthy soil.
Shredded leaves applied as mulch, 6 to 8 inches thick, now to my planting beds will be digested by mid August next.