How to Prepare Yard Waste for Pickup
Yard Waste Placement
- Pile your leaves & yard waste at the street edge or terrace.
- Do not put leaves in the street.
- Keep piles four feet from obstructions.
- Separate yard waste & leaves from brush.
Covering & Bagging Leaves
This will help keep leaves from blowing into the street. However, this is not required.
Compostable Paper Leaf Bags (Preferred): Please leave bags open at the top so we can see what is inside.
Plastic Bags: Please leave bags open at the top. Bags will be slit open and either left on the terrace or put in refuse cart.
Tarp or Plastic Sheet Cover: You may also cover your leaf piles with a tarp or other plastic sheeting to prevent them from blowing away.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Why are all of the scheduled set-out dates Sundays?
Crews will be circling through the neighborhoods during the work week following the Sunday listed.
You must get your leaves out by or on the date listed because crews start working on collecting leaves early on the Monday following the scheduled set-out date.
If you wait until later in the week, you are likely to miss your collection chance.
Crews will not return for piles set out late.
I set my leaves out on the set-out Sunday. Today is Wednesday. Why haven't the leaves been picked up?
Your neighborhood shares a set out date with other neighborhoods. It takes time for crews to circle through all of the neighborhoods that share the assigned set-out date.
If you set out leaves on the Sunday listed you have done everything right. The leaves should be picked up sometime during the normal work week.
Debris left in the road after the crew picked up the leaves.
A little bit of this is to be expected. Leaf pickup isn't fully complete until the street sweeper trails behind the leaf pickup crews.
Check out the collection process section, or watch the yard waste waste process video, for a little more detail about why we do what we do.
extra fall collection round?
Every neighborhood is guaranteed three collection opportunities in the fall. This has been the standard collection operation going back for several years.
If the weather allows, we will publicly announce an extra collection opportunity once the final leaf collection round has been completed. We recommend you sign up to receive City of Madison news releases, follow your alder's blog, and pay attention to other other reliable local news outlets so you do not miss this announcement.
We cannot guarantee you an extra collection after your final pickup round.
In years prior, when the weather has cooperated, we have done "last chance" pickups. This will continue to be our practice.
Drop-off sites also accept leaves and yard waste. Residents can also explore home composting options.
Challenges of a December Leaf Collection
In 2024, some neighborhoods final set out date is December 1. For other neighborhoods, it's earlier.
We know that final set-outs earlier than expected can be a hardship. We hear from residents each fall about needing more pickups and we are sorry.
We make our scheduling decisions based on what we know of past years' volume of leaves, and how to best distribute our staff to get leaves picked up as efficiently as we can. But we also can't predict precisely when exactly the leaves on your trees will drop. Believe us, we wish we could know this.
Snowplow Drivers are Leaf Collectors
We can't predict the weather, either.
Fall leaf pickup extends into December. And we don't know when snowstorms will arrive.
The same people who pick up leaves are the same people who drive snowplows.
We have to be mindful of trying guarantee services like leaf pickup, or brush pickup, deep into December when we need staff available for driving snowplowing equipment around the clock.
Trouble with Street Sweepers
It is also very important to note that street sweeping is a big part of the leaf pickup process. Sweepers trail behind leaf pickup crews to gather up the leaf litter that remains in the road.
Sweepers need water to work, so they cannot operate when temperatures are well below freezing. So even if the December weather is snow-free, we may not be able to run the sweepers if it's too cold.
Lastly, most of our sweepers are shipped out for an annual maintenance overhaul in early December each year so they can be ready for the spring. When we collect leaves deep into December, we may not have event have sweepers available to clean up from the leaf debris left in the roads.
In Conclusion
With all that said, and as was stated earlier, if weather allows us an opportunity to provide extra leaf collection, we will. But we can't know if this extra collection chance will be available until later in season.
Other Yard Waste Rules & Information
Drop-Off Sites
You can also bring yard waste to a drop-off site.
You must follow all drop-off site guidelines as outlined on the drop-off site page.
Yard Waste vs. Brush
Please separate yard waste & leaves from brush. We will not collect mixed piles.
What is Yard Waste?
Yard waste is the plant debris you rake or pull from your lawns or gardens. It can include:
- Leaves, weeds, grass clippings garden trimmings, and other similar plant debris.
- Twigs less than 18" long.
- Pumpkins, crab apples, corn stalks, pine cones, etc.
What is Brush?
Brush is a separate collection.
Brush is woody material you have cut from a tree, shrub or bush.
For more information about brush pickup, go to the brush collection page.
