Give new life to old Christmas trees

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As people begin to take down their Christmas decorations, the Nature Conservancy of Canada hopes they give new life to their Christmas trees.

For those with real trees, the not-for-profit, private land conservation group suggests putting it in your own backyard instead of putting it at the curb.

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Dan Kraus, NCC’s senior conservation biologist, says leaving the tree in the backyard over the winter can provide many benefits for backyard wildlife. The tree can provide important habitat for bird populations during the winter months, especially on cold nights and during storms.

The first step in letting nature help recycle Christmas trees is to prop it up near another tree, against a fence or lay it in the garden. They can even be redecorated with pine cones filled with peanut butter, strings of peanuts and suet for birds. These decorations will provide food for birds while they find shelter in the tree.

“Evergreens offer a safe place for birds to rest while they visit your feeder,” Kraus said in a press release. “Another benefit is that if you leave the tree in your garden over the summer, it will continue to provide habitat for wildlife and improve your soil as it decomposes.”

By spring, the tree will have lost most of its needles. You can then cut the tree branches, lay them where spring flowers are starting to emerge in your garden and place the trunk on soil, but not on top of the flowers.

Kraus added the tree branches and trunk can provide habitat, shelter wildflowers, hold moisture and help build the soil, mimicking what happens with dead trees and branches in a forest. Toads will seek shelter under the log, and insects, including pollinators such as carpenter bees, will burrow into the wood.

“By fall, the branches and trunk will begin to decompose and turn into soil,” said Kraus. “Many of our Christmas trees, particularly spruce and balsam fir, have very low rot resistance and break down quickly when exposed to the elements. The more contact the cut branches and trunk have with the ground, the quicker it will decompose. Drilling holes in the tree trunk will speed up that process.

“Our backyards are ecosystems of their own and provide an opportunity to learn about forest ecology. By leaving our Christmas tree in our backyard, we can understand its life cycle and observe its impact on backyard biodiversity.”