Christmas Trees for Foresters

On Sunday, The Honey and I took my parents out to get our Christmas tree. Christmas this year is at our house. Yay!

This is not the first time we have had Christmas. Two years ago in Flagstaff we had a lovely Christmas when my parents, brother and grandmother all flew down for a week. It was about the only week we didn't have snow that winter! Our tree that year was a juniper tree. It made the house smell like cat pee. Eww. But it was fun to get. We snuck out to a well known mesa and helped "improve" pronghorn antelope habitat by removing a wee juniper tree for our enjoyment. Actually, we topped it, so it probably lives on.

A sidebar: pronghorn antelope are one of the fastest mammals in North America, if not THE fastest. They are adapted to avoid predators by outrunning mountain lions, and wolves (when they were there), and thus have a high preference for wide open mesas where they can see the predators. Since we have stopped letting fires burn on the mesas, juniper trees (which would have traditionally burned) have started encroaching on the grasslands, shrinking pronghorn antelope habitat.

The point: cutting the juniper was helping the pronghorn.

Ok, so back to the tree on Sunday. It is a small Grand fir which is sometimes called (incorrectly) balsam fir. Grand fir is becoming increasingly rare on Vancouver Island, since forestry companies do not prefer it for harvesting (meaning they don't plant it back or encourage its regeneration). So wait a minute, why did we cut a Grand fir? It is ok, we got it under the power lines, which means at some point BC Hydro would have killed it with herbicides or by cutting it eventually. Conscience clear this year anyway.

Speaking of BC Hydro the power has been on and off 3 times in the past 2 weeks because of the snow and rain storms we have been having. One time it was out for 2 days which was tough when we ran out of propane, our back up heat. We have since stocked up on propane and candles so if it goes out again we are prepared. Another storm rolled through today, with another big one coming Friday.

I am getting good at knitting by candlelight though. Still working on the Angel Pearls scarf for Grandma and will post soon with the new yarn I have for my cousin's wedding socks. Yes! Wedding socks. Tell you that story next time.