Online orders, tree trimming tips, and Christmas tree fun facts from New Hampshire

The holiday season is upon us, and tree farms throughout New Hampshire are bustling with festive activity! To find out what’s happening at your favorite New Hampshire Christmas tree farm, check our interactive map. 

If you’re planning to purchase a mail order tree from one of our farms, you’ll need to do so soon! The ordering deadline for most mail order trees is around December 13^th for delivery outside of New England, and December 18^th for addresses closer to home. Many farms also offer handmade wreaths, tree accessories, ornaments and gifts through their online shops.

For those of you who are ready to trim the tree, the decorating options seem limitless! From color themes of silver-and-gold, red-and-green, or sparkling blue to a sentimental hodgepodge of cherished family ornaments, there are countless ways to decorate a tree. Homemade ornaments also add a festive and personal touch and can be eco-friendly to boot – think snowflakes cut from recycled paper, holiday ribbons tied to pinecones or sweetly scented cinnamon sticks, old Christmas cards cut into ornaments, and garlands of popcorn, cranberries and dried apples.

As we approach the Big Day, here are some fun Christmas tree facts:

* The first record of a decorated tree reaches back to 1510, when the local merchants’ guild decorated a tree in Riga, Latvia, with artificial roses.

* In the 1600s and 1700s, people in Germany commonly adorned Christmas trees with apples. In some parts of Austria and Germany, evergreen boughs were hung from ceilings and decorated with apples, gilded nuts, and colorful paper strips. Candles were added to Christmas trees in the 1700s.

* By the 1800s, Americans had caught onto the Christmas tree craze, and by mid-century, Christmas trees were sold commercially in the United States.

* New Hampshire’s own Franklin Pierce was the first president, in 1853, to decorate a Christmas tree at the White House.

* The first Christmas Tree farm in the U.S. was planted in 1901 in New Jersey, and in the 1930s President Franklin Roosevelt planted a Christmas tree farm at his Hyde Park, NY, estate.

* Today there are Christmas Tree farms in all 50 states, with some 15,000 tree farms throughout the country, covering about 350,000 acres (and preserving open space), employing over 100,000 people

* For every Real Christmas tree harvested, tree farmers plant up to 3 seedlings the following spring.

* It can take as many as 15 years to grow a tree of typical height (6 - 7 feet) or as little as 4 years, but the average growing time is 7 years.

Here’s hoping your holidays are happy ~ Merry Christmas to all!

Christmas Tree Trivia

Have you ever wondered how long it takes to grow a Christmas tree? Or when the tradition of hauling an evergreen inside during the darkest days of winter started? As New Hampshire Christmas tree farms prepare for the upcoming holiday season, we share some Christmas tree trivia...

• The first record of a decorated Christmas tree comes from 500 years ago! Local merchants in Latvia decorated a tree in 1510 with artificial roses and danced around it before setting fire to it. (Today, of course, Christmas tree decorations are much more varied, and we leave the tree up to admire it and celebrate the season for much longer!)
• During the 1600s, Christmas trees were popular in Germany and were often decorated with apples.
• Americans caught onto the tree craze in the 1800s, and by the 1850s, Christmas trees were being sold commercially in the United States. Initially, these trees were cut from forests, but in 1901, the first Christmas tree farm was started in New Jersey. Today, some 30 million farm fresh Christmas trees are sold each year in the United States.
•  In 1853, President Franklin Pierce, who hailed from New Hampshire, brought the first White House Christmas tree to the Capital.
• Today, Christmas trees are grown on farms in every state, translating to some 15,000 Christmas tree farms, 350,000 acres in production, 350 million trees currently growing, and more than 100,000 local jobs! (Artificial trees, conversely, are generally produced in China and other Asian countries, using harmful heavy metals and petroleum products.)
• For every farm fresh Christmas tree harvested during the holiday season, tree growers plant 1 to 3 seedlings the following spring.
• It takes those seedlings several years to make it to Christmas tree height – an average of seven years.
• The most common types of Christmas trees grown by New Hampshire farmers are Balsam fir and Fraser fir.