Kitchen Garden Forum

Hi guys,

Back in August we decided to take out a clump of laurels that we had planted several years ago and which were rapidly taking over the area in which they lived.

During this process I removed the leaf clusters from the main branches thinking that we would be shredding the main branches and our shredder isn't partial to leaves at all As it turns out we haven't had chance to do the shredding and so the whole pile of branches will be going to the village bonfire building tomorrow

Some of the leaves were put into the brown bin, ready for the fortnightly collection and the rest were put into several spare large flexi buckets until the brown bin was emptied or there was room in the daleks. As luck would have it other hedge trimmings and garden waste meant that only a small amount of the leaves has been able to be dealt with in the last few weeks. So the rest of them have been happily rotting down in the buckets and are now at varying stages of green-to-browness

Whilst clipping back the other Laurels today ready for the village bonfire building tomorrow, I suddenly had a flash of inspiration. Why not dig the contents of the tubs into the beds while I'm clearing and digging?

So my question is: Will this work? Can I spread the contents of the buckets over the beds and then dig them in? Or do Laurels (as is the case with flowering cherries or so I'm told) produce harmful toxins such as cyanide when they break down?

Thanks as always for your advice guys

VPM
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Laurel does have traces of cyanide compunds in it.
Does the RHS say anything about it?

Shiney/waxy leaves like laurel and camelias do take much longer than other leaves to compost down so you might find that they are still in the ground next year in more or less the same state as they are now. I'm unsure of their acidic content so too many of them in a relatively small area could possibly upset the balance of your soil, especially if you want to grow vegetables. I'd be tempted only to do this only on a very modest scale.

Thanks guys - much appreciated. Think I'll play it safe and just keep tipping them into the brown bin every couple of weeks

VPM
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Hi VPM
Many moons ago I had a Laurel hedge and I found that even five years after double digging them into the soil they had not decomposed even a fraction. Since then I have moved to a new property ( over thirty years ago) and have the same problem with Holly leaves which not only leave spines in the soil they do not decompose so they all get burnt and the ash distributed back into the hedgerow where they come from because even after burning some of the spines still defy the fire.
My advice is to forget composting Laurel and Holly and burn it.
JB.

Lol, cheers JB

VPM
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