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2005/12/29
The gifts are unwrapped, the out-of-town relatives are back on the road and the Christmas tree is lurking around the living room like a guest that won't leave. What is a person to do with 6 feet of 10,000, vacuum cleaner-choking needles?
Disposing of cut Christmas trees is a problem facing 27 million Americans in the week following Christmas. The easiest choice for home owners with property, is to convert the indoor decoration into an outdoor bird habitat.
The tree can be hauled out and placed on the property as a place for winter birds to seek shelter from the wind. Secure the tree to a fence or post, to prevent it from becoming a winter tumbleweed, and redecorate it to attract song birds. Store-bought suet cakes, seed bells and bird treats can be hung on the tree to provide birds with high-energy snacks.
At winter's end, as spring unfolds, the needle-free tree can be festooned with lint from the clothes dryer, pieces of yarn and string for birds to use as nesting material. By summer the branches can be cut off and added to the compost pile, and the trunk cut into kindling.
The Christmas tree becomes much more than two weeks of holiday decoration when used as an outdoor bird sanctuary.
For faster dispatch, the tree can be quickly de-limbed with a pruning saw and its boughs used as mulching covering, to protect tender perennials in the garden. The limbless trunk can be cut into short lengths and disposed of in regular garbage pickup.
Some Christmas tree purchasers don't have the outdoor space to use their tree as a bird sanctuary. Local law enforcement takes a decidedly non-jolly view of tree owners dumping unwanted trees on public roadways or other people's private property.
The Fauquier County landfill comes to the rescue. Trees can be dropped off at the landfill at no charge. The tree must be free of ornaments, tinsel, trees stands and hideous gifts "accidentally" wedged in the branches.
Landfill operators will take the castoff trees of December and grind them up into mulch. Come spring, residents can bring their cars and fill their trunks with bags of free mulch. It's a "bring-your-own-bag-and-bag-your-own" operation, but the price can't be beat and you may be getting a little bit of your own Christmas tree back.
For owners of pickup trucks, the landfill operator will fill your truck with a loader for $10 per load.
Recycling your Christmas tree as mulch saves precious space in the landfill and gives back to the citizens of Fauquier free mulch. Neighbors can "truckpool" and use one pickup truck to take the trees of four or five families to the landfill -- saving gasoline and helping those unable to handle discarding their own trees.
A few neighborhoods and municipalities have a specific day to put out trees at the curb for pick-up. Check with your trash hauler or town government for community pickups in your area.
Do not attempt to burn a Christmas tree in the backyard or toss one onto a campfire. The "fresh cut" tree is highly flammable and will flare up dangerously.
For those who have purchased a living tree, balled and burlapped, this is the week to get that tree planted in its permanent position. Assuming the hole was dug back in early December, the tree should be moved outdoors a day or two before planting, preferably to a garage or sheltered area, to acclimate it from the heated indoor space back to outdoor weather.
Moving balled and burlapped trees over frozen ground can be difficult and often it's easier to place the tree on a tarp and drag it to the planting site.
Before placing the root ball in the hole, remove all burlap, twine, wire and rope. The modern practice of removing all root constraints will allow for better, unrestricted root growth. Once the root ball has been completely unwrapped, carefully check the base of the trunk to ensure no collar of rope, wire or burlap remains as a choking necktie that will kill the tree.
Carefully place the root ball into the hole and backfill with the soil removed from the hole. Take care not to place soil on top of the root ball against the bark of the tree -- the tree is being planted, not buried.
Never set a tree lower in the soil than it grew before it was transplanted. Leaving the top of the root ball an inch or two above grade is ideal.
Lightly mulch the tree with no more than one or two inches of mulch.
A couple of buckets of cool water brought from the house can be poured around the base of the tree. It's not advisable to apply fertilizer of any kind at this time.
If the hole was not dug earlier and the ground is now too hard to dig, or if there is snow cover and planting is impossible, the tree can be "heeled in" until spring and still have a good chance of surviving.
Find an outdoor spot sheltered from the wind and sun, such as the eastern or northern wall of a building. The idea is to keep the tree's moisture loss and temperature swings to a minimum. Don't place it on the southern sunny side of the house where it will warm up on February and March days only to freeze hard at night.
Pile insulating material such as mulch, soil, straw, hay, leaves or even bags of top soil around the root ball; often garden centers will still have bags of mulch for sale in late December. The goal is to keep the root ball covered and cool throughout the winter.
Do not cover the foliage of the tree with plastic or a tarp. On a mild day, the needles can be sprayed with a product that prevents water loss, such as "Wilt-Pruf" or "Vapor Gard."
Build a nest of the insulating material around the root ball, thick enough to keep the tree upright and the root ball covered on all sides. During periods of mild weather, water the tree with a bucket of cool water brought from the house.
In spring, when the ground has thawed, plant the tree and it may see many more Christmas seasons as it grows to mature height in landscape.
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