North Carolina farmers use genetics to grow the 'perfect' Christmas trees

Jeff Owen, a tree specialist with North Carolina State University's N.C. State Extension, says the Christmas tree business is booming in the state.

"We are probably shipping Fraser firs to almost every state in the country," he said.

Officials say North Carolina is the number two state for growing Christmas trees and that it brings in about $250 million every year from the harvest.

There's one issue, though -- when Christmas tree farmers plant seeds every year, they have no way of knowing if the seeds will yield a good tree or a bad one.

“A lot of the Fraser firs that are sold today are grown from native seed, and that seed represents the population of trees in the forest -- not necessarily ones that make the best Christmas tree," Owen said.

The N.C. State Extension is working with the College of Natural Resources and the State Agriculture Department on a project that uses genetics to remove "bad seeds."

"Part of this process of genetics is to remove that portion of the seed population that may not be quite as good as the majority," Owen said. "Basically, you get rid of the bad trees so you can have something more reliable."

The subjects of the study are a cluster of Fraser firs currently growing on a 5.5-acre Christmas tree orchard at the Upper Mountain Research Station at Laurel Springs in Ashe County. Owen said they won't be ready for customers until 2030.

The project's hope is that the trees will grow faster. As a result, customers should notice their fresh trees keeping their needles longer and holding up well through the holiday season.

Farmers hope the genetically-controlled trees will save them time and money.

"If they can count on more trees achieving high-level quality they may spend less time in the field trying to correct problems and also be able to get a tree to harvest sooner," Owen said.