Choosing and Using A Cut Christmas Tree

What is the difference between a "Cut Tree" and a "Live Tree"? - By the way, tree lots like to call these "live trees" to distinguish them from artificial trees, but to my way of thinking, the only real "live trees" are the ones you get with root systems in pots. Even those seldom survive the Christmas season if you bring them inside for more than three days. (Please see our article What about Live Christmas Trees? for more information on this topic.)

Does using cut trees damage the environment? - To some people, it seems harsh to cut a tree down just to use for a decoration. But cut trees don't harm the environment - in fact, tree farms replenish the environment like no other kind of farming. Disposal is another issue - see if someone in your area recycles Christmas trees (they usually grind them up for mulch or something like that). That way the landfills won't fill up with a material that, left up to nature, would deteriorate quite naturally and beneficially on its own.

Aren't cut trees dangerous? - They can be, which is why we have so many little warnings buried in this article. People who set up their tree correctly and take care of it almost never have problems, and they get to enjoy the appearance and scent of a natural tree during the holidays. On the other hand, a tree that is allowed to get very dry is a dangerous fire hazard. For that reason, you'll need to pay attention to two major factors related to tree safety:

• Keeping the tree as fresh as possible so it's less likely to catch fire if it is exposed to flame - Doing this requires choosing a fresh tree, setting it up right, placing it away from things that radiate heat (like registers and television sets), and making certain the reservoir never runs out.
• Keeping the tree away from things that could cause combustion - This includes real candles, old-fashioned lights that get hot, cigarettes, overloaded wiring, and worn extension cords. It also includes gradual sources of heat (like television sets) that wouldn't ordinarily be a problem, except that, over several days, they can dry the tree out enough to catch fire with just the gradual build-up of heat.

Where should I plan on setting up my tree? - Before you decide on what kind of tree to use, think about where it will be sitting. Safety is the first consideration - if the only place a tree can go in your house is very near a heating register, radiator, or television set, consider an artificial tree. Horizontal space is the second - wherever you decide to put a cut tree, think about how much room you'll actually have for the tree and the presents going around it. Just because your ceilings are ten feet high, doesn't necessarily mean that you can use a tree that is five or six foot wide.

If you have less than 6' of horizontal space and want a fairly tall tree, consider a tree that tends to have a comparatively narrow growth pattern, like most firs. And take a tape measure when you go shopping so you can measure the width of the base of the tree.

If you have less than 4' in either direction, consider:

• A very narrow "specialty" artificial tree, the kind they sell at craft stores.
• A "tabletop tree" - For a classic look, consider setting a 3'-4' spruce or fir on top of an end table or something to get it to the height you want. Remember, for most of the 1800s, most Christmas trees in Europe and North America were tabletop trees.
• A Eastern Red Cedar - These have many disadvantages (see below), and they are hard to find on tree lots. But in some parts of the country they literally grow like weeds, and they have the "slimmest" natural shape of any tree that is commonly used for Christmas trees.

Where should I buy my cut tree? - When I was researching this article, I found about four hundred prominent web sites run by cut-it-yourself tree farms that say you should only buy a tree from a farm where you can cut it yourself. They argue that most trees on the tree lots were cut weeks ago and shipped from several states away. In Clark County, Ohio, there are many cut-it-yourself places, and some of them are run by friends of ours, so we have cut our own several times. It is a unique experience you really should try at least once.*

That said, over the years we've gotten many good trees from tree lots. Most tree lots trim their trees twice a year to keep their conical shape, and they harvest and ship the trees in such a way as to prevent damage and preserve freshness as much as possible. Also, the trunk of a cut conifer that isn't put into water quickly will seal itself and keep moisture from leaving (or entering) through the cut. (This is good for shipping trees, but it means that you have to cut a bit off when you get ready to put the tree up, or it won't receive water, either.) What's important from then on is that the tree stays fairly cool.

When should I plan to buy my tree? - As counterintuitive as this may seem, sooner may be better than later.

• If you wait too long to go a cut-it-yourself place, you may find that the good ones have already been taken. Yes, many tree farms let you tag a tree on your first visit, but, sadly, they have no control over whether your tag stays on the tree until you come back. You may be better getting one soon after Thanksgiving, while the selection is still good, then propping it up somewhere with its trunk in a bucket of water for a week or two than to wait until mid-December.

• The same principles applies even more to tree lots. Most tree lots get one or two shipments. Sure, every time you go by, they have new trees on display, but those trees are just coming from a pile or truckbed of trees somewhere out of site. So you have the choice of:

  • Letting the tree lot store the trees in conditions you can't control, and buying it later when the selection is poor, or

  • Buying a cut tree soon after Thanksgiving (when you have a good selection), and leaving it in a cool shady place until you're ready to put it up.

    If you visit a tree lot, wiggle the branches of the trees you are considering to make sure they're still supple and that the needles are still flexible. Note: This doesn't work as well on Spruce, because their branches and needles are stiff naturally - try several Spruces to get the "feel" of those.

    When you find a tree you like, pick it up a few inches in the air and drop it on the trunk. There will be a rain of brown needles from inside the tree. This is natural - most of those needles may have come off before the tree was harvested, as part of the tree's normal growth cycle. Do it again. Be ready to pass if:

    • The tree seems very lightweight for its size,
    • The tree starts looking perceptibly thinner as you bump it,
    • The pile of needles keeps growing much larger after the first bump, or
    • Green needles fall off in any number.

When should I plan to put up my tree? - That depends on what kind of tree you buy, how long you want your tree up after Christmas, and how warm and dry it is in the place it will be standing. As an example, if you need your tree to last inside more than ten days, or if the tree will be in a room that you will be keeping warm with forced-air heat, be certain to look for trees with good "needle retention" (Scotch Pine and Frasier Fir are among the best). Conversely, if you're going to have your tree up less than ten days, and it will be in a relatively cool room (preferably with radiant heat), you may like the look of a Spruce.

What kind of tree should I buy? As the previous paragraph hints, some trees are more suitable for certain purposes than others. For example, Spruce trees tend to have great shape, prickly needles, and sensitivity to heat - so they're great for relatively cool places where looks are important, and the trees will be decorated by adults. Entrance halls and church lobbies come to mind.

As I write this, in Southwestern Ohio in 2007, the two most popular trees are probably the Scotch Pine (our country's all-time standby), and the Frasier Fir, the most popular "premium" tree. Both hold their needles well and smell great. (All other things being equal, I would probably buy a Frasier Fir every year the rest of my life. They tend to look great, have many good branches for ornaments, and their fragrance is almost intoxicating.)

Still, every few years, a new species of tree comes into common use, so it's worth comparing and contrasting several of the trees you're mostly likely to see this year. If you want more details on commonly-used trees, you will find most of them described in the University of Illinois Extension article Tree Types.

Or contact us if you have a question you can't find the answer for, or if you know of a kind of tree we should add to the list.

Note: We have added a printable version of the following matrix that you can print out to take to the tree lot with you. You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to print it. Click here to download the Field Guide to Cut Christmas Trees. This file also includes a one-page list of safety tips.

Tree	Needle Color	Needle Length	Needle Stiffness	Holds Ornaments Well	Needle retention	Fragrance
Scotch Pine	Dark-Green	1-3"	Medium, not too prickly when fresh	Good	Excellent	Good, stays fragrant for days
Frasier Fir	Silver-Blue on outside, Deep Blue-Green on inside	1/2" - 1"	Soft when fresh	Very good, has many small, strong tips	Very Good	Excellent
Canaan Fir	Silver-Blue to Deep Blue-Green	3/4" - 1 1/4"	Soft when fresh	Very good	Good	Very good
Balsam Fir	Dark Silvery Green	3/4" -1 1/2"	Stiff	Very good	Good	Very Good
Douglass Fir	Deep Green	1"	Stiff	Good	Very good	Very good
White Pine	Green	2-5"	Very soft	Poor, branches may be too soft to hold some ornaments	Good	Fair-may be the best for families with plant allergies
Blue Spruce	Silver-green on outside, power blue or blue-green on inside	3/4" - 2"	Stiff, youngsters will find them "prickly"	Very good, will hold heavy ornaments	Fair, do not like warm rooms	Good
Black Hills Spruce	Gray-green on outside, blue-green on inside	About 1/2"	Stiff, youngsters will find them "prickly"	Very good	Fair, do not like warm rooms	Good
White Fir	Green	1/2 -1 1/2"	Soft when fresh	Good	Good	Good
Austrian Pine	Deep Blue-Green	3-6""	Medium	Fair, needle length requires long ornament hooks	Good	Good
White Spruce	Green	1/2" - 1"	Somewhat prickly	Good	Good	Good
Norway Spruce	Dark Green	1/2" - 1"	Medium	Good	Poor - not recommended for warm rooms	Very good
Eastern Red Cedar**	Dark Green	1/4" - 1/2"	Very prickly	Poor, individual branches are too vertical and weak to hold some ornaments	Poor, dries out quickly	Good

What kind of stand should I buy? Consider strength, reservoir size, trunk width, and stability.

• Strength - A cheap plastic stand may hold a tree as long as it doesn't start to wobble, but remember that a tilting tree loaded with ornaments actually exerts a prying motion on the edge of the stand where the trunk is fastened. Imagine putting a 2"x2" or 4"x4" into the stand (depending on the size of the tree you plan to buy), then forcing it ten degrees to one side. Does it look like the stand would hold? Note: some of the new vinyl stands that have built-in reservoirs are pretty substantial, so having plastic components doesn't automatically make it a bad tree stand. Just think about it.

• Reservoir Size - A 6' or taller cut tree may absorb a gallon of liquid the first day it is in the house. If you don't have a large reservoir, you'll need to check the tree at least three times a day the first two days and twice a day thereafter. You must not let the tree trunk become dry, or you have reduced the usability of your tree to a few days at best, even if you refill the reservoir again - more on that later.

• Trunk Width - Trunk widths vary by species and also by whether the tree has grown to its present height quickly or slowly. But you must remember that a taller tree will have a wider trunk. More than one family that went from six foot trees to a nine foot tree suddenly realized that the tree trunk wouldn't even fit into the tree stand. (By the way if this happens to you and you need to take some wood off the trunk to get it to fit this time, do your trimming on one side, so as much of the bark can remain as possible - the layer that brings water up into the branches is just under the bark. If you slice off the bark all around, you'll remove this layer, too, and, again, reduce the usefulness of your tree to a few days.)

  On the other hand it's hard to keep a tree with a four-inch trunk stable in a tree stand that is suitable for an eight- or ten-inch trunk, so planning ahead works both ways.

• Stability - Giving my age away again, when Shelia and I got married only one kind of tree stand was available. It had a metal ring with three screws going into it, three legs, and a metal reservoir. The problem was that if you got as large a tree as the stand's ring would accommodate, the tree would be top-heavy compared to the size of the stand. I bought the largest stand we could buy. Then we bought a house with higher ceilings, and we started using bigger trees, and discovered that even the biggest stand wasn't stable enough for anything over seven feet. Finally I screwed the stand to a 2'x3' piece of shelving with a Formica veneer, and I put little rubber feet on the bottom of the contraption to keep the shelving from scratching up the floor. The weight of the shelving helped, of course, but the big help was the fact that the wider base added much more stability.

Note: When you've picked out the stand you think you are going to use, measure the distance from the top edge to the inside bottom. That tells you how far the tree's cut must be from the lowest course of branches for your tree to work in the stand. Lots of folks have forgotten to take that into account, then been disappointed when they had to take a ring of branches off the tree to get it to go into the stand. On the other hand, you'll probably find a use for that greenery, I'm sure.

Prepare and Stand Your Tree

Make the final cut - Remember when I said that a cut evergreen's trunk seals itself and keeps moisture from getting out or in? Well, right before you put your tree in the stand, you need to cut off at least an inch of trunk to get to the part that will still absorb water. I usually do this outside, then try the tree in the stand before I bring it into the house. Again, if you have to shave off some of the diameter of the tree to fit it into your stand, leave as much of the bark as you can, even if what's left of the trunk seems lopsided.

Once you've made that cut, try to get the tree into the stand and water into the reservoir within an hour (some people say you have up to six hours, but I'd rather have the tree absorbing water sooner than later). When you are setting the tree in the stand, make certain it is as vertical and as stable as you can get it before you start decorating. For trees over 5', it helps to have another person steadying the tree while you tighten the little screws. View the tree from several angles to make certain it stays vertical as you tighten. Then, when you're all "done," stand up and pull the tree a little each way from the top to make certain it is really "locked in place." Better to find out if the thing is going to shift out of position now, than later, when it has thirty pounds of lights and decorations on it.

Watch the water level - Top off the reservoir within six hours, and again six hours later. A healthy cut tree can absorb a gallon of water the first day, although it will taper off. If the reservoir does go empty and stays that way for long, the trunk will reseal itself in a few hours. You will have to decide whether to take the tree down, re-cut the trunk, and put it back up or to take the tree down within a few days, Christmas or not.

Decorate - This part is up to you, except that I would recommend that if you are using strands of lights, that you put those on first. Some safety issues regarding lights include:

• Use lights that generate little or no heat, like the mini-lights (little) or the LEDs (almost none).

• If a light strand seems to be getting brittle, or the lamps seem to be "loose," replace the srand.

• If you must use extension cords, watch their rating compared to the rating of the light strands. And make certain the cords aren't running somewhere that will trip people or that let people walk on them.

• Make certain that the total lights and other electrical items near the tree (Christmas village, train set, etc.) don't total enough to overload the circuit the tree is plugged into.

Note: I always try the light strands before I untangle them (or stretch them out from the packaging if they're new). Then I try them again after I untangle them. Then I try each strand after it has gone the tree. So far, I haven't had a strand go out after the tree was decorated, but I have saved myself a lot of work by checking them at various stages during the decoration.

Keep a safety watch

• Make certain that sources of heat, like registers and television sets, are several feet away from your tree.

• Always unplug your tree when you are not in the room with it, especially when you are going to be away from the tree for any period of time.

• Top off the water every morning and evening. When the tree stops taking water, that's a sign that it is not long for this world.

• At least once a day, wiggle the branches to see if the branch tips and needles are still supple. Any of the following signs mean that the tree is becoming especially dangerous:
  • The branch tips become stiff, or, worse yet, brittle,
  • Needles near the branch tips are starting to turn brown, or
  • Many needles fall every time the tree is jostled.

Note: We have also created a one-page list of safety tips that you can print off and keep for your reference. It is the second page in our Field Guide to Cut Christmas Trees. file. You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to print it. This file also includes a one-page matrix of comparison information for various cut tree types.

Conclusion

We are especially hoping that this article helps you have a happy and safe holiday season.

Please contact us with any questions, corrections, additions, or other suggestions.

And have a great family Christmas,

Paul and Shelia Race

www.familychristmasonline.com

*Here is an anecdote that is somewhat related to this article. The first time we tried cut-it-yourself places we started with the amateur tree-farms within a mile or two of the house. My oldest daughter, then about seven, had taken her best friend Suzy (not her real name), a brilliant, but opinionated young lady of about 6. The first "tree farm" we visited advertised all trees for $10, a good price even then. Unfortunately that "tree farm" (and the next two we visited) had obviously never trimmed their trees (all Scotch Pines), so that they were mostly shapeless.

At the first place, we had walked about thirty yards down one row of fat, stumpy trees looking for any tree that was worth ten dollars, when Suzy announced, to no one in particular, "Well, I've had about all of this nature stuff I can handle." The happy ending to this story is that by the time we did get a tree (at a more professional tree farm a few miles further away), Suzy and my daughters were having a good time running through the tree rows and were disappointed to leave.

In case you wondered, our last several cut trees came from "The Cutting Farm," 8367 Milton-Carlisle Road, New Carlisle, Ohio (phone: 937-882-6652).

If you visit, tell them you saw it on FamilyChristmasOnline.com. You won't get a discount or anything, just a courteous blank stare. :-)

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**No, you won't generally see Eastern Red Cedars (actually a kind of Juniper) on tree lots. They usually form a pleasant, slender cone shape, which helps them fit into tight places. But their needles can dry out quickly and become very scratchy and flammable. Also, their branches are so slender and vertical, they are hard to hang "store-bought" ornaments from. That said, decades of use have made them "traditional" in hilly Southern areas, where they grow like weeds, in vacant lots, in abandoned fields, and on rocky hillsides where little else will grow. Don't cut one down without permission, though.

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