good thing I use artificial.

Just get yourself a fake one...
Probably even better in a long run, financially and ecologically.

As lost as it doesn't have lead.

Or maybe not.

@chouchou: as long as it doesn't contain lead :)

Artificial. My husband and I have had the same one I bought from Goodwill 4 years ago. I continue a proud tradition of artificial trees. My mother buys one about once every decade or so.

Go green buy only recycled Christmas trees this year....

Festivus Pole

Woohoo for not being Xtian!

We've had a fake tree since 1975. It's got beautiful snow flocking and smelled like pine. Our party guests never knew it was fake! My mom spent about $500 back then and my pops was furious, but it's been a great money (and tree) saver. It finally came out the box for the last time in 2005. 30 years of saving money on a real tree isn't bad.

It's sad that my first thought actually was "oh no, the trees!"

Thanks for reassuring us lame people, Meg. :)

Fake is cheaper in the long run, Eco-friendly, safer in regards to fires, and can be decorated just like a real tree. SAVE THE TREES.

I don't get the "fake trees are eco-friendly" argument. They're made of plastic. Plastic is not eco-friendly. And what's so bad about cutting down a tree that was grown specifically for the purpose of being cut down?

If you have the space to store it when not in use, an article tree is your best bet. As for their verisimilitude to real trees, most (decorated)Christmas trees I see are so piled with crap that you can't make out more than the tree's general outline.

^^artificial, not article

@phantomfly: Also, you can't compare a real tree to a plastic one. A better compairison would be 20 real trees to a plastic one.

On top of that, look for a fake tree that can be recycled.

We have a fake tree. Considering the price we paid (free) I won't buy another "real" tree. It was my parent's tree, they didn't need it anymore so I got it.

Now if I can get my wife to thin out the ornaments we have...

Like many people, we've gone the "fake tree" route.

If it were all up to me, we would not have a tree. I associate Xmas trees with the pain of having to deal with a hyper-critical father who believes that Xmas trees have to conform to some sort of imaginary military spec. He has some notion of what the tree should look like but he has his sons put it up instead of doing it himself. Suffering all around, I tell ya. After years of that kind of pain, I've been conditioned to associate putting up Xmas trees with suffering.

I've been out of the paternal home for several years now. However, my wife wants a tree. If our tree were natural, I'd have at the very least to bring it in, set it up in its stand and move it out. (In this household, those tasks would fall upon me as my wife does not have the stamina for it.) With an artificial tree, my involvement is minimal because my wife can move it wherever she wants and set it up without problem. Sometimes I help with electrical issues or with stabilizing the angel at the very top of the tree but that's about it.

She has her tree and I don't have to deal with putting it up. Everyone is happy.

If you think about it, growing trees specifically to be stored in a house for awhile, then sent to a landfill or to a compost pile is actually a great way to capture carbon out of the air and store it in a way that doesn't re-release that carbon.

Unless, of course, those discarded trees are just burned in a bonfire. Then, I would be plastic all the way.

'Real' christmas trees are not eco-unfriendly.

AS A CHRISTMAS TREE FARMER, I have to tell you folks I firmly believe that fake trees are terrible. I'm in New England and we operate a small choose-and-cut (pick your own) tree farm. We don't have any trees this year, we sold out a few years back and are waiting for new ones to get to size. I have not heard the NPR story yet.

You're not "saving" a tree by not buying one. Real Christmas trees are grown on farms -- like broccoli -- for the very purpose of being cut down and going into someone's house. Just because it's a tree doesn't make it any less of an agricultural crop. If you don't buy it, do you think the farmers will let them grow and "reforest" the land? No. Something else will be grown on that land.

Real trees aren't made with petroleum products, and a real tree won't catch fire if you use common sense and water it properly. Fake trees, when they burn, will emit plastic fumes. Faulty light sets or open flames are bad ideas near any Christmas tree.

I don't know of ANY fake tree that is recyclable. The parts are mixed plastic and metal, and it's not like the "needles" are stamped with a number. Many communities "recycle" real trees by chipping them into mulch.

Real trees are not a source of lead.

Real trees that are sold in the US are grown in the US or in Canada -- again, on farms. Fake trees are nearly all made in China.

I think fake trees are okay for people who are allergic to real trees, and perhaps some apartment dwellers with limited room (although you can get little tabletop real trees). I've seen plenty of places that sell real trees that are affordable for everyone -- $10 to $50.

For me, there's nothing like a real tree. And that's always been true, long before I started raising them.

@Lemur
Umm this isn't the therapy forum.

Real environmentalists use real trees.

I support my local small farmers by cutting down a tree every year. That tree removed a lot CO2 from the atmosphere. When we're finished with it, it becomes a habitat for birds and small critters in the backyard where it eventually decays into the soil. If you don't have a backyard, many towns collect and mulch them for use in landscaping, saving you money. Real trees are the ultimate renewable resource.

Your artificial trees are petroleum-based, made in a polluting factory, and shipped halfway across the globe. It's a waste of resources and damaging to the environment. Those of you using artificial trees should be ashamed of yourselves for thinking that you're doing the responsible thing.

Save the Earth. Cut down a tree.

Christmas trees are a huge scam(for the sellers). My dad used to sell trees as a farmer decades ago and would sell pine trees whole for $400, even back then. Poeple who sell then for $10-25 are not making anywhere near the money they could simply selling the whole tree, and not be left with a useless stump.

When we were younger my parents always bought a live tree and planted it in the yard after the holidays - now 20 years later we have quite a few trees. Now my parents have a huge fichus tree in the living room year round that they use instead of a traditional Christmas tree.

killing trees is such a STUPID holiday tradition.

1) Enjoy having tree sap on your car and shelling out $75 to $150 for tree carcass? NO.
2) Does it have to do with the "meaning of Christmas"? uh no.
3) Is it safe? Like putting an explosive powder keg in your living room kind-of-safe.Watch that bonfire kids!
4) Do our landfills need dead trees every January? NO.

@cmdr.sass:

Ever consider NOT using a tree at all? Or how about using a live potted one and planting it after you are done with it?

Menorah prices unaffected! Woohoo!

@ironchef: I just hate all the lazy bastards who got real ones and then dump them in vacant lots or on the curb. Too lazy to dispose of it correctly...don't buy it!

I really hated my boyfriend's ugly-ass artificial tree, so I bought him a 3 foot tall Norfolk Island Pine tree about 8 years ago (it was displayed on a coffee table for a few years, so it wouldn't be a "Charlie Brown" tree). It's now almost 5 feet tall. My brother has a living Christmas tree that stays outside most of the year and then gets moved indoors in mid-December.

Growing up in New England (and being related to 2 Xmas tree farmers), we never had to pay more than $25 for a real tree. Living in NC now, one of the major producers of Xmas trees in the south, I've yet to find a tree cheaper than $35. We've found a farmer who's had a family stand in our area for around 20 years and now purchase our tree from him. I don't feel bad about "cutting down" a tree, because they are grown to be cut down, and our municipality recycles the trees every year for landscaping mulch.

@ironchef: I'm just doing my small part to fight global warming. I could take your advice to bury my head in the sand and do nothing but that would make me part of the problem instead of part of the solution.

@surgesilk: So what?