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Drought in Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania affecting Christmas tree farms

After weeks of drought, some Christmas tree farmers, like Jeff Hill near Orwigsburg, have noticed their younger trees dying off.

ORWIGSBURG, Pa. — After weeks of a moderate drought in some parts of Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania, many of the younger trees on Christmas tree farms in our region are all dried up. 

One Christmas tree farmer in Schuylkill County is concerned about what this may mean for the future.

"I just love what I do; farmers don't retire; we just keep going," said Jeff Hill, the owner of JC Hill Tree Farms.

Jeff Hill has been a farmer for his entire adult life.

"Planted my first tree when I was 18," said Hill.

But now, 47 years later, he no longer has the luxury of only planting trees. He's forced to rip them out.

That's because for the past few weeks, Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania has seen little rain. Some of the younger trees at Jeff's farm near Orwigsburg haven't been faring so well.

"You can see the root system just doesn't go deep enough to get the moisture and a lot of them just can't hang on, you can see the dead trees there in the field,” said Hill.

Although this doesn't affect this year's sales of Christmas trees for the next five to six years, it's adding to a problem Jeff is already facing.

"This is where we really get hurt, and there's a shortage of Christmas trees, and this keeps the shortage going on because you can't get your new ones to survive," said Hill.

A shortage that's being caused by a changing demographic in the tree industry.

"The average age of a tree farmer is like 64 years old, 65 years old, that's me. There's nobody young getting in the business; that's why there really is a shortage," said Hill.

However, there's still hope for this year.

"This [older tree] is not stressed out, once again, because its roots go deep. This is going to be fine when it's cut for a Christmas tree this year,” said Hill.

Jeff said that if you do plan on taking a tree home to make sure you only put it up after Thanksgiving and to check its water several times a week. He said if you follow his advice, you're going to have a healthy Christmas tree.

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