Holiday trees get second life as wildlife habitat
Although it might seem a bit early to sound the death knell for the household Christmas tree, it’s not too soon to think about the possibility of a new home for it.
Consider the bottom of Lake Moultrie, where currently 19 “fish attractors” marked with buoys are built out of old evergreens. The same holds true for Lake Marion, home to a dozen of the man-made habitats for little fish and the big ones that eat them.
“They make really good fish habitat,” said Mark Schlievert, Berkeley County director of solid waste.
Holiday trees brought to the county landfill are set aside for the state Department of Natural Resources to use for its fish attractor program. “Whatever they don’t take becomes compost,” he said.
To build a fish attractor, a half-dozen or so Christmas trees are sunk by weighting them with a cinder block. “It’s been a real successful program for us,” said DNR spokesman Brett Witt.
Fish attractors are marked with buoys. DNR asks that the public not toss a tree at such a site because it could create a navigation problem.
Read more in upcoming editions of The Post and Courier.
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