Oh, Christmas Tree

Why we need live trees for the winter solstice

Bringing trees into our homes and businesses is not a recent celebration of Christmas. It is an ancient tradition dating back to our oldest celebrations like Saturnalia. These festivals, ancient and modern, coincide roughly with the winter solstice. It is almost certainly an opportunity to welcome living plants into our homes as a promise of spring to come. The tree is a celebration that life continues even after the longest nights.

Christmas Trees

One afternoon, I sat in a dark movie theater watching the premier of Sleepless in Seattle, and its Christmas scenes made me a bit nostalgic for home. I walked out of the theater onto Petaling Street in Kuala Lumpur, having forgotten for a moment where I was. Petaling Street is always busy, lined with shops and stalls selling the most wonderful food. The street was filled with wondeful fragrances as I walked along, until suddenly, I was struck by the powerful smell of fir trees, certainly unexpected in this place. I walked up the street, following the smell, and came to a stall selling fresh, live fir trees for Christmas. Of course, I bought one, and took it home though I had no decorations.

I have always loved the smells of homes at Christmas, created by a blend of volatile chemicals from Christmas trees and from baked goods made with other tree parts, like cinnamon and nutmeg. The fir tree releases a bewildering mix of terpenes, volatile compounds that the trees produce for protection from pests and pathogens. Fir fragrance is different from pine fragrance, and smells nothing like the familiar cleaning chemicals that contain pine. For many of us this complicated, wonderful blend of fragrances is deeply evocative of childhood (in later stories, we will talk more about the importance of plant odors in our lives).

Soon, the festivities come to an end. For those of us with real Christmas trees, the fragrance persists, even while some needles fall off. When I was a child, everyone bought real trees, and I never saw artificial trees except in fancy stores. Even some of my Jewish classmates in Baltimore had Hanukkah trees, though with different decorations. Sadly, today, nearly half of American households use artificial trees. The tradition of bringing real trees into our homes which has existed for thousands of years, is fading away.

Christmas trees are produced by farmers, often as a supplement to other crops. When we buy a tree from a farmer, or a roadside stand, we are supporting the people who grow, harvest, ship, and sell the trees. Christmas tree farms have low environmental impact and maintain healthy soils and biodiversity. Increasingly farmers are growing native flowering plants between the tree rows. Consumers are asking farmers to cut back or eliminate pesticide use. Christmas tree farms are fine examples of sustainable land use.

And when we are done? Christmas trees can be tossed in the trash, but they have a useful life after we are done with them. On my farm, my children would leave popcorn and cranberry garlands on our tree and we would carry it, with laughter and ceremony, into the fields. where the trees provided food and shelter to wintering birds. Many cities provide opportunities for our trees to be converted to mulch to give away or use for park maintenance.

My favorite use today will take place next week when the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources collects trees at drop-off points, loads them on boats, and drops the trees into our lakes. The trees, weighted down, refresh and supplement the woody debris that is essential to fish, both game and non-game, and to invertebrates. Our trees help to create ideal habitat for our aquatic vegetation and animals.

So there we have it. Buying a live, cut tree locally allows us to bring the natural world into our homes as a promise of spring to come. Live trees support farms, land conservation, farm workers, and landowners. When we are done, the same trees support our aquatic ecosystems or landscape management.

Artificial trees do none of these things. Fake trees made of plastic and metal and transported thousands of miles to our homes, contribute little to our lives or to local economies.

I greatly fear that we are becoming less connected to the natural world. As I will discuss further in stories to come, this disconnect from nature is very harmful to our society, and certainly to the richness of our lives. Next year, get a live tree. The world will thank you.