Why you should be saving all the autumn leaves you can in your garden

People have lots of different ideas about autumn leaves but come this time of year, come what may, they are piling up all over. They fill street gutters, blanket pathways and catch in lawns. Dropped leaves in various shades of brown are everywhere.

They are an unsightly mess for some, a seasonal delight for others and pure gold for gardeners. But while growers have always understood the power of fallen, faded foliage to rot into a wondrous concoction that improves soils, a whole new troupe of autumn leaf devotees has sprung up this season.

The prompt? Leaves as big as monuments that have appeared in art galleries in Melbourne and Sydney. These elaborate ruses have crumpled over floors and curled up walls. Some have folded in on themselves, like some leaves do.

Made by collaborating artists Joshua Petherick and Lewis Fidock from burlap, steel, rope and all sorts of other unlikely-sounding materials, these playful works might be absurdist but they also highlight the fact that disintegrating leaves are not to be toyed with. They are a natural bounty that we should be hanging onto.

At this time of year it’s worth going outside and gathering up all the foliage you can. Not only will the leafy stash turn into a high-performance soil conditioner that will cost you not a cent, fungi will do all the hard work for you.

They will break down the leaves into a soft, dark mix that will improve your soil’s structure and its water-holding capacity. This leaf mould will help your soil lure more worms and grow healthier plants. It has no downside.

But to get it you will need to make the stuff, which might not require money but will take some space – at least at the start of the process when the leaves are freshly shed and at their most voluminous.