Real or Fake Xmas Tree???

[Marni]

Okay -- should I stop killing a tree a year and buy my family a fake tree this year? I love the whole ritual and smell of a real pine -- but aside from wasting a live tree, I've heard they are DRENCHED in toxic pesticides.

Anyone want to try and sway me one way or the other???

[hubris]

2004 Grist column:
http://www.grist.org/advice/ask/2004/12/08/umbra-tree/

She gives two suggestions:

The bottom line: Go for the actual tree and try to support a small-scale sustainable grower if you can.

there's the "Don't buy a tree at all!" option, which I trust you have all already considered. If not: Have you thought about having no tree and living vicariously through the trees of others, decorating a living exterior tree, decorating a house plant, or making your own tree as an ambitious crafts project?

She also mentions buying a live tree and planting it later, which my parents did for many years and often still do...but that only works if you have a yard appropriate for the planting of that tree, and the time/ability/memory/etc to actually DO it.

The Green Guide has an article but you have to have a subscription to read it (I don't have one but I'm thinking about an e-sub).

[Greenmama13]

We get a live tree

My dh and I get a live (balled) tree each year. We leave it outside until a few days before Christmas because they say the heat is bad for it. Then we plant it the day after Christmas. You would obviously need a place to plant it. My family thinks it "non-Christmasy" to have it in the house for such a little amount of time, but after a few years its become part of our tradition. Plus, its so much fun to watch them GROW. The first tree we planted 7 years ago is HUGE now. Plus, we often put lights on one or more of the planted trees.

[CarrieMF]

Growing up we always had live trees. There were no trees you could buy around so my parents would drag us 20minutes North to Grandpa's farm to cut down a tree. Mom usually got a pile of snow down her jacket when Dad would shake the tree to see if looked nice(if it did in the woods, it never did when they got home,lol). The 1 year we had one that ended up being full of cocoons. Now the skating rink gets some so they buy one.

Now where i live there hardly any trees, much less spruce so we have a fake one. I'd buy a real one from the stores, but we have carpet where a tree would go and I'm not digging needles out of carpet. The little green "leaves" that shed off this one are bad enough.

[hubris]

Originally Posted by Greenmama13

My family thinks it "non-Christmasy" to have it in the house for such a little amount of time, but after a few years its become part of our tradition. Plus, its so much fun to watch them GROW.

YES!

My family's tradition is to decorate the tree on Christmas Eve, probably because we usually had a live tree with a root ball. The dry, warm air inside the house wasn't good for the tree so the common American practice of putting up a tree soon after Thanksgiving wouldn't work for that! I love waiting. (Granted, DH's family is a day-after-Turkey-Day family, so he and I have had to compromise.)

Watching them grow is awesome. My parents have a row of evergreens one one side of their property that were all Christmas trees. They're enormous now.

[Valkyrie9]

Along similar lines, we were at Lowe's the other day and I bought a rosemary bush pruned in the shape of a Christmas tree. We're going to be out of town over Christmas, and we won't get a real tree this year. We'll put a few little ornaments on it to look festive, and we'll enjoy fresh rosemary. It's an option...

[Marni]

Thankks folks! GREAT LINK funshine!!!! Took care of all my research in one shot, LOL.

Unfortunately we DO live in the city, and haven't any place to re=plant a tree : ( And I'm selfish -- I want a tree of our own. So, I'm thinking we will do another real tree for now. But I WILL seek out a locally grown one and find out if there is a less-pesticide use option.

[MonP'titBoudain]

Originally Posted by Valkyrie9

Along similar lines, we were at Lowe's the other day and I bought a rosemary bush pruned in the shape of a Christmas tree.

I LOVE this! We are also going to be out of town this year and I was thinking that we'd prbably get a Norfolk Pine or something like that as a small tree. I was also considering getting a few branches of fresh tree (rather than a whole chopped down tree) and putting them in a big vase and decorating that. We don't really ever have space for a tree so small is always best. I'll have to look at the rosemary!

[kaydee]

I bought a tall iron "ornament tree" that we will trim, and I will cut some small boughs from a few of our trees to make it more green. I am pretty happy with this option, though it won't look traditional.

[HerthElde]

:
trying to decide what to do.

[Mama Dragon]

Personally, we usually do fake. I grew up with fake because my youngest brother is allergic to something with the real trees, and we (after I married DH) tried a time or 2 to have real tree, but between the kids, the dog, the cats, the needles dropping everywhere, it was just a mess. The fake are much easier to care for, etc. This year we decided no tree, just decorations until the youngest kids are out of the toddler/destructive phases, it's just not worth it.

[holyhelianthus]

we go the fake rout and here's why-
the smell of pine gives me and awful headache and makes me vomit. no lie. i have no idea why but i broke the family tradition when i was little. they *always* got a real tree. then i starte getting awful headaches and spending December puking and they figured it out. to this day i can not walk by a real Christmas tree without my eyes tearing up and my head feeling like someone just hit it with an ice pick.

[MonP'titBoudain]

Originally Posted by kaydee

I bought a tall iron "ornament tree" that we will trim, and I will cut some small boughs from a few of our trees to make it more green.

I profess ignorance. What is an iron ornament tree? And where might one find something of that nature? I've thought about the small fake trees, but I'm not a big fan of them for many of the above listed reasons. Is this basically a decoration in the same vein but made out of iron?

hmm......

[Meiri]

We've done both. I think we'll stick to the boxed tree this year, no space.

I wouldn't mind having a SMALL live tree that we could plant. Actually, I'd love doing that. We did that one year when I was growing up. That tree got to be a good 50' tall. They finally had to cut it down, but it had a good life in our front yard for decades. Maybe I should see what the local farm has. With relatively new carpeting though, the needles might become a sticking point.

[kaydee]

Originally Posted by MonP'titBoudain

I profess ignorance. What is an iron ornament tree? And where might one find something of that nature? I've thought about the small fake trees, but I'm not a big fan of them for many of the above listed reasons. Is this basically a decoration in the same vein but made out of iron?

It's basically a metal sculpture shaped like a bare tree. You attach the "branches" and hang ornaments off of them. There are all kinds out there, ranging from kinda chintzy to really fancy and beautiful. We got something somewhere in between from Smith & Hawken (www.smithandhawken.com). There's another place that has ones ranging from 20" to 7 ft high: www.ornament-trees.com.

[whateverdidiwants]

We do fake because we're in South Florida and a real tree won't last long here without drying out, my cats would eat the needles and puke all the time, and it wastes a huge amount of fuel to get real trees here. At least with my fake tree you only have to expend the fuel once.

[Llyra]

We get a real tree. For me, Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without the smell of fir or spruce in the house. I cut it at a local farm, and compost it afterwards.