Autumn has arrived and with leaves falling from the 8,000 trees on campus, maintenance and landscaping crews have their work cut out for them.
Out of mowing grass, plowing snow and raking leaves, leaf pickup is the least time consuming, but still an important part of campus maintenance, Mike Planton, director of environmental management, said. Leaf pickup doesn't begin until October, but with the weather being so dry, trees drop their leaves because they cannot provide enough moisture to support them.
"We really try to do as much as we can as the leaves are falling," he said. "We try and mow them and mulch them into lawn, which is the best thing we can do."
The entire leaf collection process takes a total of about four weeks. Crews use rakes and leaf blowers to make piles and then use two vacuums to suck up the leaves to be transported.
Plantons said rain creates one of the biggest challenges with leaf collection. The rain makes the job easier by bringing leaves down with it, but a dry leaf is much easier to pick up than a wet one.
"It's kind of a catch-22. You don't want it to rain, but if it rains really hard, they all come down at once, and then you can get the job over," he said.
Crew members then transport leaves to Ball State University's Heath Farm to be composted, resulting in about 3,000 cubic yards of finished compost each year, Planton said. The compost is "finished" after a process of putting it through a grinder and into a large pile. Once a month it is turned to help break it down before sorting. Planton said it looks like dirt when it's finished.
All of the compost created at Heath Farm is reused throughout campus in landscape beds, as a top dressing for grass and to improve soil.
Leaf pickup ends when the snow falls, but some maintenance is required into winter months to clear leaves out of landscaping beds.
"It's nothing magical, we just have a lot to pick up," Planton said.
Click here to see an interactive about how a leaf changes color in the fall.
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