Christmas is less than two weeks away, and many Kodiak residents have begun putting up decorations, like lights, plastic lawn ornaments and, of course, Christmas trees. And while some may opt for a plastic tree, there are several options for anyone looking for a real fir or spruce this season.
On Dec. 13, Mary Lindscheid, the secretary for the Kodiak Kiwanis Club, was setting up dozens of trees, wreaths and garland spread across a concrete floor inside a storage room.
“Usually there are trees all along this wall and of course these are stacked, and sometimes they are stacked so that we’ve got layers here. We’ve got them sorted by height, type, stuff like that,” said Lindscheid.
The club organizes an annual Christmas tree sale fundraiser out of the Worldwide Movers Warehouse. In years past, they sold the trees out of a connex van in a parking lot and have gradually scaled up to the larger storage room at Worldwide Movers.
Lindscheid said with only one weekend left in their season, roughly a hundred trees have already been sold and just a couple dozen remain. The last day to buy a tree, garland or wreath from the Kiwanis Club is Sunday, Dec. 15.
The Kodiak Kiwanis Club ordered about 140 trees this year from Olympic Mountain Evergreen, a tree farm wholesaler in Washington state. Since the trees had to be delivered via ocean vessel into Kodiak, Matson gave Kiwanis an in-kind donation by transporting the trees for free from Tacoma to Kodiak.
This season’s selection includes three different kinds of Christmas trees – Douglas, Nobles and Nordmann firs.
Drew Devries, the president of the Kiwanis Club, said the organization’s tree sale is a tradition that’s been going for more than 30 years.
“The trees go up in price every year and we try to keep the prices down and make it affordable so that everyone can come in and have a tree, or a garland or a wreath,” said Devries.
But that’s not the only way for thousands of Kodiak residents to get a real fir tree during the holiday season.
Todd Dorman and his wife Celeste own and operate the Dorman Tree Farm in Bells Flats, south of Kodiak – the only place in the state growing non-native Christmas tree varieties.
The farm is open every weekend from Thanksgiving until Christmas. Dorman didn’t share how many trees have been sold but said so far, turnout has been as good as they’ve ever had.
“It’s been pretty consistent for about five or six years,” he said. “We finally got up to where we had a good crop of trees, or we had enough trees of size, to satisfy pretty much anybody that wants to buy one.”
The tree farm started with 500 trees almost 20 years ago. Now, it’s spread across roughly 2.5-acres, which is part of the Dorman’s larger 5-acre property. He now grows 20 varieties of trees, where Kodiak Island residents can choose a tree and cut it down themselves. Dorman said it fills a need in the community.
“For people that want to do the traditional Christmas tree, go out with your family and cut a Christmas tree and carry it back, do the whole Christmas tree farm thing,” he said. “We’re definitely filling that niche for those people and we really enjoy it.”
There are also less cost prohibitive options for cutting down a live spruce or fir tree somewhere else on the road system, but it’s important to know who or what entity owns the land and what their rules are.
For example, cutting live trees is prohibited on land owned by the Kodiak Island Borough. The Borough does allow residents to cut trees that have already fallen down for firewood, as long as they pay for a $25 permit and verify the location of the tree is within Borough land.
The same goes for Kodiak State Parks, which includes Fort Abercrombie and the Buskin River State Recreation Site. No trees can be cut down within state land.
On unrestricted state lands, the state Department of Natural Resources allows each household to harvest one tree, outside of state parks.
Residents can contact the DNR with any questions or reference an online map to view state owned land in Kodiak.
Regardless of where the tree comes from, Devries with Kodiak Kiwanis urges folks to practice proper fire safety by keeping the tree three feet away from a heat source, and to water it daily.
