Christmas Tree Facts-Real vs Artificial

Knowing the facts about Christmas trees and their production will give you a new appreciation of them this holiday season, and may help you choose between a real tree and an artificial tree.

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Buying a real Christmas tree supports local agriculture.

• Real Christmas trees are grown on farms like other crops. To ensure enough trees for harvest, growers plant one to three seedlings for every tree harvested and an estimated 40 to 45 million trees are planted each year in North America.
• Christmas tree farms stabilize soil, protect water supplies, and provide refuge for wildlife.
• Often these trees are grown on poor soils where other crops won’t grow.
• About a half-million acres are used in the U.S. to grow Christmas trees, preserving much green space.
• An acre of Christmas trees produces enough daily oxygen for 18 people. Trees on farms in the U.S. currently provide enough oxygen for 18 million people a day.
• There are an estimated 446 million trees growing on Christmas tree farms in the U.S. and are grown by about 21,000 farms, which employ about 100,000 people.
• The time to grow a tree (6 to 7 feet) for sale can vary from 4 to 15 years, with the average being 7.
• About 25 to 30 million real trees are sold in the U.S. every year. Top-selling trees include Balsam fir, Fraser fir, and Scotch pine.
• The top Christmas tree growing states are Oregon, North Carolina, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Washington.

Fake Christmas trees are imported from China and are made of plastic.

While many real Christmas trees in the north are locally grown, supporting local agriculture, over 80 percent of artificial trees worldwide are made in China. No chemicals and few pesticides (if any) are used on real Christmas trees, with studies showing no residues on harvested trees. Artificial Christmas trees are often plastic and may contain the flexible version of the plastic polymer PVC. Manufacture of PVC creates the most toxic man-made chemicals, dioxins. An artificial tree may also contain metal toxins such as lead.

Christmas trees in the home, both real and artificial, account for less than one-tenth of one percent of all home fires, according to the National Fire Protection Association.  Real trees kept fresh are difficult to ignite.

Real Christmas trees can be recycled. Fake trees cannot.

Real Christmas trees are recyclable, often chipped into mulch at local recycling centers.  The average family uses an artificial tree for 6 to 9 years before discarding, where it will remain in landfills for centuries as they are not recyclable. A study by Swedish researchers found that considering all the inputs, a real tree is five times more environmentally compatible than an artificial one.

More facts on Christmas trees, including their history and how to care for them, are available from the National Christmas Tree Association.

A version of this article originally appeared on Perrys Perennials.