Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful annual Christmas tree recycling program underway

RENO, Nev. (KOLO) - From your living room to local parks. Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful is once again shredding Christmas trees to help keep Northern Nevada safe.

On Saturday, December 26, 2020, Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful and its volunteers started their annual Christmas tree recycling event. The organization has been doing it for 17 years.

“These trees will be chipped and turned into other park projects - mulching, and other parks in our region,” said Matt Webber, a KTMB employee.

Webber expects to shred more than 10,000 trees between now and the event’s end-date: January 10, 2021.

“Unfortunately some people will take their trees to the desert and dump them and that causes a fire hazard,” Webber said. “(Shredding trees) also keeps trees out of our landfills so we can save some space there.”

The recycling program provides great opportunities for volunteers. Casey Clark and his son, Ryan, showed up to the Bartley Ranch drop-off location to give back.

“A couple of months ago Boys Team Charities, another organization, also donated time,” Casey said. “We put this same wood chip around local parks and trees.”

Using the scraps from the wood chipper not only helps maintain public areas in Northern Nevada, it can also aid landscaping efforts.

“The public can come and use that mulch if they’d like,” Webber said of the aftermath of the tree shredding. “We just ask that they contact the ranger or KTMB and they come get it themselves. For all the mulch that isn’t used, the parks will use it for weed abatement as well as beautification.”

Bartley Ranch is just one of the drop-off locations.

The Reno Sports Complex, Shadow Mountain Sports Complex in Sparks, and Truckee Meadows Fire Department stations 32, 46, and 440 also accept trees.

The tree recycling program runs daily from 9 am until 4 pm.

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