Since we have SO many Japanese maples in the PNW I thought someone here might have an answer to my question. I thought I remember hearing that Japanese maples aren't very good to use as mulch for the winter. I have no clue why that might be. I had a nice big pile of walnut leaves until the big wind storm yesterday dropped a tree on the pile (luckily covered so the leaves are still in a pile) and we wont be able to get it cut up for a while. So instead I have a bunch of nice red maples leaves I still need to rake and wondered if I could use them instead on the perennial beds. Any idea why I shouldn't be able to use them? Thanks !!!!!

I like using maple leaves the best because of their color. I do have a fair amount of big leaf maples trees that I gather from, but I also swoop up all the leaves from my lawn and that includes several J. maples. I have not found any noticeable problems, and am curious about any information. I'll also ask my cousin who has a huge collection of J. maples, although he doesn't particularly garden so may not know.

Kelli, I've poked around online and asked a couple nursery folks what they thought - and I have not been able to come up with any reason not to use J. maple leaves for mulch. I'd go for it if I was you. Their color holds better than other leaves I think. My aspen, for example, turn kind of a golden color on the tree, but when they drop and are mulched they are just a dirty brown color. Not a bad look, but I like the warmer tones of the maple leaves.

Thanks Deb. I think I will work on that tomorrow assuming the weather isn't too awful. The long range forecast seems to show freezing weather around here in about 10 days. Although I don't trust the forecasters very much But the freezing weather will come eventually regardless. Thanks again!