Public urged to recycle Christmas trees

Recycled trees are shredded and used in parks

Residents are being encouraged to recycle their Christmas trees rather than just dumping them.

About 6,000 trees were recycled last year according to the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead.

In Oxford 1,792 trees were recycled in 2003 - 30% more than last year.

The recycled trees are shredded, composted and turned into a soil conditioning for parks.

Recycling boost

Maidenhead Councillor Simon Werner said: "While more than 6,000 trees recycled last year is a significant amount, there are more than 58,000 households in the Royal Borough so we have to encourage even more people to give their trees a good green end to the season.

"We appreciate that many homes use artificial trees these days, but it would be a very upbeat end to the Christmas season it we could boost real tree recycling even more and make 2003 the best ever."

This year there will be more than 20 locations throughout the borough where residents can take their Christmas trees from Monday 5 January to Monday 19 January.

In Oxford people can drop of their tree at any one of eight sites around the city between Sunday 4 January and Saturday 10 January.