That makes sense, thanks! Neighbors and peer pressure I’ve found are one of the most difficult hurdles to overcome when it comes to restoring or maintaining native ecosystems, for those who are interested in doing so.
Good point about the fire safety aspect. It’s interesting: prior to human disruption and development, wildfires were a massive key to the sustainability and reinforcement of health for native flora and soil. Most cities won’t let you perform prescribed fires on your property to try to emulate that (for good reason, of course!). Because you’re removing the leaf barrier during drought, the next best thing to conserve moisture in the soil would be locally produced mulch. A good rule of thumb is to mulch at least a couple inches deep all the way to the drip line of the tree (where the roots extend to and even beyond), just imagine a line dripping straight down from the very outer circumference of branches on the tree. And as another user said, never put any mulch or other organic matter within a few inches of the trunk to keep decaying matter and the organisms it attracts away from the tree tissue.
The pest control aspect theoretically should work itself out by keeping the native ecosystem as intact as possible. Too many pests means an abundance of food for beneficial predators such as wasps, dragonflies, songbirds and birds of prey. Of course if you’re referring to pests as meaning invasive species that outcompete natives, that’s much trickier.
I’m sorry for the wall of text and unsolicited advice but it is a passion of mine so it’s hard to shut up once I start. That stuff is literally worth it’s weight in gold to the natural world; you might even want to try composting it as another option, but anywhere you move it to will be all the richer for it.
In any case, I appreciate the engineering of your jolly green giant leaf sucker and I hope it serves you well if you continue transporting the leaf litter.
For any Americans capable of voting who aren’t planning on voting, fuck you. Exercise your rights. In fact, exercise in general; a good benchmark to aim for is the ability to outrun cops. The future of monocultured, homogenous, morbidly obese, microplastic and PFAS leachate-laden Judases who filed in to toe the line for the ruling class and shun their brethren will be all that’s left on earth after the richest cretins rape the planet for its last naturally occurring resources and pile into the most market-tested, fool-proof space vehicles manufactured by literally the singular winner of capitalism. Capitalism, the golden child of pyramid schemes. Those bovine-shaped humans left on earth crawling on all fours ruminating highly processed refuse will still be muttering out loud to themselves how it was all worth it. “At least I won’t accidentally befriend a trans person” because it will have been years ago that they were banned and disappeared magically. Heart disease continues to run rampant on this future Earth, however. And there’s of course the carbon dioxide problem. Somewhat bittersweetly for the Bovine sapiens species, the last remaining vestiges of oxygen-starved brain activity need only worry about one thing: sniffing for morsels through heaps of plastic waste.