The most beautiful things can be formed and crafted from autumn leaves: creative garden decorations, winter quarters for small animals… Leaves also serve a practical purpose. The leaves are useful, for example, as frost protection on flower beds or for enriching the soil. In this regard, you have to consider a few things with the walnut. You can find out more on this page.
Walnut leaves contain toxic components
Compost walnut leaves?
In contrast to other tree species, the leaves of the walnut are unfortunately only suitable for composting to a limited extent. Two important properties are responsible for this:
- Walnut foliage is slow to rot
- Walnut foliage is toxic in high amounts
What slows rotting?
The leaves of the walnut tree contain tannins, so-called tannins. These are essential oils that, while highly valued in medicine, become a problem when composting walnut leaves.
Note: Have you always wondered why hardly any small plants thrive under your walnut tree? The tannins are also responsible for this. The rainwater washes the substances out of the leaves and transfers them to the ground. An underplanting of a walnut grows poorly, similar to conifers.
Which plants not to mulch with walnut?
The tannic acid it contains can be fatal to the following plants:
- summer flowers
- onion plants
- perennials
If you cannot use the leaves of the walnut because of your choice of plants, you will find helpful information here on how to dispose of the leaves.
alternatives
The separate compost heap
Mixing walnut leaves with your other compost will slow down the entire decomposition process. Nevertheless, you do not necessarily have to dispose of walnut leaves. However, you should separate the leaves from the rest of the leftovers on a separate compost heap. There are even many plants that enjoy acidic compost. This special enrichment is used particularly in bog beds. Add the decomposed walnut leaves to the substrate of:
- hydrangeas
- heath plants
- rhododendron
- numerous forest plants