I Want You… To Recycle Your Old Christmas Tree!

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Savannah District is hooked on recycling, and using old Christmas trees to attract fish to northeast Georgia’s lakes proves it.

I Want You… To Recycle Your Old Christmas Tree!

Merry Christmas… and thanks for all the fish! That’s the plan, anyway, and if the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Savannah District knows what they’re doing (and you can bet your boots they do) there’ll be fish aplenty in Lake J. Strom Thurmond for many years to come. It all starts with used Christmas trees, in this case collected by volunteers at Riverside Middle School in Evans, Georgia, as part of the Corps’ annual Christmas tree recycle program. It would be simple enough to feed the discarded trees into a wood chipper but the USACE has found an even better way to recycle them: submerged evergreen trees make great fish attractors. Who knew? Well, besides fish that is.

As any fisherman worth his bait is well aware, underwater objects like trees are liked by small fish, who appreciate the shelter they provide. The more trees, the more shelter and the more small fish which collectively attract even larger fish. As for the larger fish, they tend to attract fishermen, some of whom participate in fish attractor schemes that complete this particular recycle of life.