Christmas trees for indoor and outdoor decoration during the Yule season remains an important tradition in America. While some artificial trees and other decorations have taken their place, the living evergreen tree or conifer is still the most important.
Cutting Christmas trees is a thriving industry in certain areas of the country. Many trees are cut from the wild, but there is a growing interest in Christmas tree farming and more and more literature on the subject is becoming available each year.
Just about every species of evergreen known in the United States probably has been used as a Christmas tree. However, certain species are much preferable to others. One of the things people look for in selecting a good Christmas tree species is ability of the needles to stay on over the period the tree will be used.
The limbs should be of sufficient strength to hold decorations, ornaments and tree lights. Reasonable denseness in growth is desired as well as good symmetry. Most people object to species that have harsh prickly needles. Of course, the person who ships the trees wants trees that have sufficiently pliable branches so the trees bundle and ship well.
Some conservationists may question the practice of cutting Christmas trees, calling it a wasteful practice. That may be so if it is not properly done. However, we must remember that thinning is an important commercial forestry practice to develop strong stands of timber that are not overcrowded. In other words, the cutting of Christmas trees can serve to ”kill two birds with one stone:” i.e., the removal of saleable Christmas trees, and the thinning of overcrowded tree stands.
When young trees are first planted, close spacing is desired at the beginning to provide necessary shading of the ground until the trees become well established. Then as the trees grow taller, supervised thinning is mandatory to allow sufficient room for the remaining to grow into sturdy timber trees.
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