I have many of these trees in my backyard, but this picture was taken last December when my family and I were out getting our Christmas tree. The tree is evergreen, resinous, and coniferous. It grows well in weak soil, of which there is a lot around Harrisburg. As an evergreen, it retains its needles all year, unlike deciduous trees that lose their leaves in the fall. The tree provides food and shelter for many different kinds of squirrels, chipmunks, birds, rabbits, and other small animals. These animals eat not only the needles, but also the cones and bark of the tree. The many branches provide ample shade, cover, and perching area.
The trees daily activities usually consist as follows: standing. And sometimes they are trimmed and chopped down by humans for holidays, firewood, just because we can, and a whole host of other reasons. Although I have listed much more extensive activities for my other blog posts, those were animals, they do things. Trees stand there and absorb sunlight, water, and CO2, and then emit O2 and 'eat' the sugar they also produce.
The Virginia Pine usually grows to heights of approximately 9-18 meters, but the ones most of us use as Christmas trees are more in the range of about 10 feet tall. At the ten foot height they have a base of about 5 feet in diameter. If allowed to grow naturally many live to be 65-95 years old. The Virginia pine is found in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, and of course Virginia and West Virginia.
Trees are vital to the continued existence of life on earth. Without them we would quickly consume all the oxygen we have and then everything would die. Not a very good picture. We are killing our forests and we need to stop before we find that we can no longer replant all that we have destroyed. There are consequences to a more comfortable lifestyle, but dying should not be one of them.
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