by Gary Waters

Created on: December 12, 2009   Last Updated: December 21, 2009

To say buying a Christmas Tree is bad for the environment is like saying it is bad for the environment to purchase fresh flowers or the traditional Halloween pumpkin. The Christmas tree industry is just another branch of the agricultural business like the fern growing industry here in Florida.According to the national Christmas Tree Asoociation sales for live trees topped One Billion dollars last year.

These trees are not cut down from Walton's Mountain they are propagated for the sole purpose of decorating your home during the holidays . The north Carolina growers association estimates that there is over 25,0000 acres of christmas tree farms in that state.That is 25,000 acres or continually replenished forest.

Each year when the trees are cut and sold, new saplings replace them. It is not like stripping the rain forest for special wood to cover the floors of the rich and vapid and then never replaced. Instead they are grown on a farm like cotton, tobacco and any other agricultural product.

Actually buying a live tree is better for the environment than buying an artificial tree. Most areas have yard waste pickup where the waste is used to create compost and some areas collect the trees and make mulch for use on municipal properties.

Years ago in North Carolina, the counties asked people to bring their old trees to the beach where they were stacked along the beach to hold the sand in place and dissuade erosion. Even if the tree is thrown into a landfill it will naturally decompose and be a benefit to the earth.

Artificial trees are made of plastics that may last as long as the cockroaches and with the prelit variety so popular today, the life of the artificial tree has been shortened. When the lights burn out many will just toss that marriage of metal and plastic into the garbage.

So go ahead and buy your live tree and help the family that grows them and when you dispose of it, you know it will go back to the earth and enrich the soil it came from. Just remember no tinsel or fake snow that will leach chemicals into the earth.

Instead try a garland of popcorn or cranberries that can be eaten by the birds and squirrels as your tree waits for curb pickup. For a happy and healthy planet buy a real tree this Christmas.

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