Caring for Your Freshly Cut Christmas Tree

Even though I have posted this on my regular blog westcoastnana.blogspot.com I felt it would be a good idea to post it on here as well as there are different readers here then there.


As most people will be getting their real tree this week I thought I would give you some tips on how to keep it fresh longer. We have tried a lot of different ways depending on who we spoke to and have found that this has worked every single year. We like our tree up the first Saturday in December and we don't take it down till the 1st or 2nd weekend in January and we rarely lose needles. The only time it did not work was when we mistakenly got Grand Firs instead of our usual Noble Firs. Grand Firs have amazing true Christmas tree scent but only last 2 weeks at the most. Which is ok if you only put your tree up the last week .

-When you get home, decide where you want your tree and once decided, cut at inch off the base. Do this EVEN if you only chopped it down an hour before. Sap starts drying up within minutes of a tree being cut.
-The stand needs to hold at LEAST one gallon of water. A freshly cut tree can take up at least 4 litres of water a day in the first few days.
-Make sure the base is in the water. At times we just check the stand and think as long as there is water in it, the tree is fine, but if the base is not in the water it can not take any water into the trunk.
-Fill the stand with BOILING water. Keep an eye on the stand and keep it full.
-Keep using boiling water for the first 48 hours, after that regular temperature water is okay.
-You do not need sugar, syrupy solutions, aspiran etc in the water. Plain water out of the tap works plenty fine
-Keep it away from registers, fireplaces and heat sources. If you do not use LED lights make sure you don't leave your lights on for extended hours as the heat from the lights does dry out the needles which in turn dries out the branches.

That's it.. pretty simple. Enjoy your tree and if you have any questions please feel free to ask away.