All spruced up for Christmas
How do Christmas trees live before they get into the living room? DW gets festive in the forest with a look at some of Germany's evergreens in their natural environment.
Out of the forest, into the city
Around 30 million Christmas trees were sold in Germany last year, 90 percent of them grown in the country, according to the German environmental protection association NABU. Christmas trees have sprung up in cities all over Germany. At the Christmas market in Bonn, a cherry picker usually used for repairing street lights was called in to help decorate the trees with around 650 light bulbs.
Freshly cut
Checking the cut surface of the tree can be a good indicator of how fresh it is. If trees are able to first acclimate to the temperature transition, for example in an unheated garage, and are kept in water, they can last inside the house for more than a month. German Catholics often keep their trees inside until Candlemas, a Catholic holiday on February 2.
Leave beetles be?
The needles of spruce trees are attached to the branches individually, in a spiral shape. Farmers growing spruces are careful to check them for bark beetles, which tunnel into the bark to mate and lay eggs. Intervening in a beetle outbreak is controversial - some environmentalists argue that the beetles should be left to their own devices, even at the expense of the forest.
Evergreen avenue
This curving avenue of sequoia trees in a forest just outside Bonn in western Germany is among the longest of its kind in Europe, sayss farmer and forester Hubertus von Groote. Sequoias are known for being the largest and tallest trees in the world. This variety, the dawn redwood, is the only type of sequoia tree to shed its needles in autumn. Thus, it doesn't make for a very good Christmas tree.
Sensitive saplings
Depending on the variety, Christmas trees can take between five and eight years to grow tall enough to be harvested and decorated for the holidays. Young trees like this sapling are vulnerable to harsh weather. In Germany, they also need to be protected from wild boar, which seek out their juicier branches while they are still close to the ground.
Winter blues
The blue spruce is recognizable by its characteristic blue-gray color. With its hard, spiky needles, this species first begins to produce seed when it is around 20 years old. Its wood is often brittle and full of knots, so it is rarely used for its timber.
All I want fir Christmas
The Nordmann fir is a European favorite for Christmas trees, as its needles are less sharp and drop less quickly when the tree dries out than other varieties. Nordmann firs are often planted in mixed forests, as their deep and wide spreading roots help to protect the woodland from storm damage.
A gift from Norway
The Norway spruce, or European spruce, is among the fastest growing Christmas tree variety. In good conditions it can grow almost one meter per year. The Christmas trees in the central squares of New York, Washington D.C., London and Edinburgh are Norway spruces sent every year from the Norwegian capital, Oslo, as a mark of gratitude for the aid these countries provided during WWII.