A gardening expert has urged the public to dispose of real Christmas trees in one of three ways at the end of the festive season.
Michael Griffiths, who regularly shares horticultural advice with his 254,000 TikTok followers, took to his platform to explain. “Starting with the boughs of the tree, cut them off and you can lay them in your containers and garden beds for frost protection,” he advised.
In an instructional video he added as an alternative: “Or if you want a thicker ground cover you can put them through a shredder to get some free wood mulch.”
Michael also recommends digging a hole in the garden and placing the stump of your Christmas tree in it. “Now you have a perfect trellis for climbing plants in the spring,” he enthused. “This will be ideal for sweet peas.”
He continued with his closing recommendation: “You could also drill some deep holes into the stump, cut it up, rinse and repeat, stack it up and you now have a bug hotel creating a mini refuge for wildlife.”
“Great ideas!” one of Michael’s followers declared. “So much more eco-friendly.” A second praised: “Going to save so much money with these life hacks. God bless.”
A third added: ” Will be doing the bug hotel – love that simple idea.” Whilst a fourth hailed: “Good way to reduce, reuse and recycle naturally.”
Others, meanwhile, explained their own methods of disposal, including one TikTok user who penned: “We give our old Christmas trees to our goats! They eat it down to the trunk. Then we use the dried trunk for firewood.” And a second revealed: “Our local beach to us collects them to put until sand dunes for stabilisation.”
According to the UK government, if not reused or recycled, Christmas trees can end up in landfill – which is costly to both the environment and the taxpayer. The cost of landfilling an average of eight million trees comes to around £22 million.
Environment Minister Rebecca Pow said: “Millions of families around the UK celebrated Christmas with a beautiful Fir or Spruce tree in their home, but when the decorations are taken down, it’s important that we dispose of trees sustainably. If you have a tree with its roots still attached, then replanting your Christmas tree is a great way to reduce your carbon footprint and help our efforts to plant more trees.”
She continued: “But if replanting is not an option, make sure to check what collection and recycling services are available where you live. Alternatively, if you have a compost bin or heap, then you could break up your tree and add it to the compost. If, however, you have an artificial tree, then make sure to look at ways of keeping them for future Christmases so they don’t end up in landfill where they can take centuries to decompose.”
