(CBC)

Welcome to our weekly newsletter where we highlight environmental trends and solutions that are moving us to a more sustainable world.

Hi, it’s Nicole. We all love raking leaves, right? Yeah, I didn't think so. So do we really need to? I take a look at why it might not be necessary.

This week:

To rake or not to rake?

The Big Picture: Winning wildlife photo

How one company is making money – and jewelry – from abandoned mine sites

To rake or not to rake?

Fallen leaves can provide habitat for insects and more, but too many on your lawn isn’t a good thing. (Giovanni Love/Shutterstock )

It’s that time of year again, where you can leave your bedroom window open at night and fall asleep with a cool breeze brushing across your face and listen to the sound of leaves rustling as you doze off.

To be clear, these aren’t the leaves on the trees, but rather the dried up ones that have fallen as the season begins to transition to winter.

Collecting all those leaves is a tedious and back-breaking job that a gust of wind could undo at any moment. As more people are looking to more natural gardens and lawns, should we be raking up the leaves at all?

“As most things in science go, it depends,” said Sara Stricker, communications and outreach coordinator at the University of Guelph’s Turfgrass Institute.

She noted that there is a campaign called Leave the Leaves, supported by the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation.

We may not notice it, but leaves provide habitat and shelter for insects, butterflies, moths, and even some birds.

“So, the idea behind not raking your leaves is to leave ecosystems for insects to winter. And that is, on its front, correct,” Stricker said.

But, she went on to say that Canadians are not very good at doing that: as soon as we see the first green shoots, we start mowing, fertilizing and gardening, celebrating the last of snow.

Paul Zammit, a professor at Niagara College's environment division, said that our understanding of how leaves contribute to ecosystems is cons