By the way, I have a Forest Management degree so I think it is an interesting business you have. I have thought about converting some of my land to grow Christmas trees, but the market is too small here where I live in the Ozarks, and the competition is large growers in Michigan and Wisconsin. The site index around here is very marginal due mostly to poor to marginal soils. The small farmer niche today is organic. A family farm cannot compete against the large corporate farms, and the multinational farming conglomerates.

I compete with the big growers by offering a very high quality tree and excellent customer service. We kept our farm small to have better quality control. The quality and service is lacking with the big growers. My trees usually end up on high end lots.

I believe most of the chemical problems are caused by the big growers. They use helicopters and planes to apply pesticides. Spraying pesticides from 25 to 50 feet over a crop imo your asking for drift problems. I have very large buffers between my fields and streams. I've seen the timber companies spraying pesticides with helicopters within the creek canyon. Others use air canons on tractors which can also result in a lot of drift. I use a Honda Fat Cat motorcycle with a tow trailer behind with a 27 gallon tank. I built two booms one for ground spraying (weeds) and a stand-up boom that sprays directly on the tree from the side. This takes longer for me to spray a field because I have to drive each row, but the spray goes where I want it. I'm also very careful to use minimal amounts of pesticides. For one thing they are very expensive so you don't want to waste it or over use it.

I'm sure there must be some tax breaks you get for running your business, which is the same as subsidies. I don't disagree with that, just wanted to point out that government hands out a lot of breaks to agricultural pursuits.

When you say subsidies I think of farmers getting paid to not grow a crop. Yes we get Capital gains tax benefits. As you may be aware Christmas trees is an investment where you are investing money every year until the crop is harvested. This can be 6 to 12 years depending on the size of the tree and the species. Many people decide to plant Christmas trees but don't realize how much work and how much investment is required to produce them. What happens is we see a lot of fields that are let grow to timber after about three years when they have to start pouring money into topping, shearing, fertilizing, weed and bug control.

We also are able to write off expenses on our taxes. Which has been great for purchasing equipment and supplies. These tax breaks we receive spurrs the economy by providing jobs to many people. Without the tax breaks we would definitly do with less in order to survive another year.

There has been an oversupply of Christmas trees the last 4 years and as a result prices are lower than when my dad sold trees in the early 1980's. Many farms have gone under as a result as our expenses have increased while the price has decreased. We've also lost market share to the artificial tree. Many people have been drilled into cutting trees is bad, some think the trees come out of the national forest and I've even heard one of my customers say that a tree hugger came onto his lot and accused him of cuting the tree tops out of the trees. We're trying to educate people that cut real trees is good for the planet because they produce oxygen when they grow and tie up carbon. The trees are grown on farms like carrots and potatoes for peoples enjoyment at Christmas time. The Christmas tree industry also provides jobs to many Americans. People who build the equipment or supplies we need to grow, harvest and retail the trees. The trees are also bio degradable if they make it to a land fill so they will break down into soil. When you compare that the fake tree is made of plastic in China and after a few years when they are disposed of they don't break down. There are no green benefits to an artificial Christmas tree.

This is a shame.