Sustainable Living Christmas Tree

How does the one come to terms with the dichotomy of respecting all life (including the VERY valuable lives of trees) with the desire to celebrate the Holiday tradition of a Christmas tree?

One Time Use Christmas Trees. They’re Alive Until…

They are cut down, wrapped and shipped to Kauai. These trees are readily available and affordable; they are the Christmas trees most of us grew up with. 

These Christmas trees trees tend to be varieties of Fur, Spruce and Pine. 

• Cut trees are readily available at major retailers. 
• The critical downside to cut trees is that they are typically factory farmed. That’s not all that bad, but… mono crop farming lends itself to disease and pest problems that natural, diverse habitats do not experience. This weakens the overall environment and leads to the “need” for chemical herbicides and pesticides. Yuck, for all; as it leads to more petrochemicals in the environment.
• If they look like mainland pines, well, they are. 
• They were grown on factory farms, cut, shipped, and displayed as “Christmas Trees”. 
• Come January, they are relegated to either an epic beach fire, or to our local landfill. It’s sad to see so many trees literally “kicked to the curb” just after Christmas. 

Your typical Christmas tree is 8-10 years old when harvested; yet their natural lifespan can be centuries long.

Isn’t there another way? 

Can’t we enjoy indoor Christmas trees without subjugating their lives?

Pines are magnificent life forms. They thrive all the way into the Arctic circle and back down to us in the subtropics.

Lucky for us, we have a Better Christmas Tree

The Norfolk Island Pine Araucaria heterophylla Originated from Norfolk island a small 14 Sq mile island between Australia, New Zealand, and New Caledonia, is the quintessential Kauai Christmas tree. This is the tree that you see all over Princeville, Kilauea, and many other parts of the island. It is a tall, straight, evergreen pine. 

It was initially brought here by European sailors; who planted the trees so that they could later harvest the trunks if they needed to replace a broken ship mast on future journeys.

From then on the tree has become a part of the Kauai landscape and one of the few truly abundant pines on the island. This tree has become the Hawaiian and Australian Christmas Tree.

The Sustainable Solution

The Norfolk Pines give us the unique opportunity to foster a living Christmas tree. With one tree, you can get years of Christmas joy. You can either continue to grow the tree in a ceramic pot throughout the year, or plant the tree in your yard!

If you decide to plant your tree, the Norfolk is still an extremely sustainable tree. When you cut down the tree, two or three new tree sprouts will begin to grow out of the stump. From these new growths, you can grow up several new trees to begin a new living tree cycle at your house.

For those of you wishing to celebrate Christmas on Kauai, and wanting to do it in a sustainable way, we at Garden Ponds cultivate a selection of Norfolk Island Pines in a variety of sizes, ranging from 4″ pots to 7 Gallon pots. Wanting to make sure you get the perfect tree for your Hawaiian Christmas. 

We are able to deliver your tree to your house (cost varies based on distance)

Foster A Tree

• Purchase your tree for this Christmas,
• Enjoy it as long as you like
• We’ll pick it free of charge, anytime in the future
• Repeat, year after year, or not!

You can keep your potted tree to enjoy, or we will take it back. If your tree gets too big, you leave Kauai for extended periods, or you’re afraid you might kill it; no problem give us a call and we will come pick it up free of charge.