After the holidays, when the gifts are unwrapped, the decorations are put away and the tree is thrown out of the house, life usually quiets down. But local recycling centers can’t just forget about Christmas trash.

In fact, they prepare to be busy around the holidays. 

“From Thanksgiving on, I make sure I have a full crew,” Wilton Recycling Center manager Carol Burgess said. 

And there are certain items they expect to see more of around the holidays.

“What I do see is a lot more of the mail-order boxes,” she said. “Funny thing a lot of people are doing now is ordering furniture,” and they bring the big boxes to the recycling center. 

“We average a truckload [tractor-trailer size] of cardboard every two months,” Burgess said. 

Caleb Hall, Greenfield Recycling Center supervisor, is curious about the trends in materials being recycled.

“You get to see what people buy, and what they don’t buy,” Hall said, “Last year we were still coming out of COVID. We were seeing a lot of (online pet store) Chewy boxes.”

Hall wondered about the bigger economic impact. He did a little research and learned Chewy stock had nearly tripled in value. This year, he’s not seeing so many Chewy boxes, and the stock has gone down more than 30 percent. He has noticed fewer Amazon packages, and in the last year, the Amazon stock has dropped about 50 percent. 

And “we’re always getting in exercise equipment,” Hall said, noting that people regularly take up exercising and then quit.

In 2021, Hall said the recycling and trash coming in after Christmas was overwhelming. Overflow was piled up on the deck. In 2022, on the Tuesday after Christmas, Hall reported, “This year, it doesn’t seem to be anywhere near as bad.” He theorizes that this could be due to more people going back to shopping in brick-and-mortar stores. 

A couple years before the COVID pandemic, China stopped taking trash from the United States. Then, although Hall said that Greenfield continued to recycle during the pandemic, a lot of recycling centers just threw everything in the trash. 

New Hampshire only has one landfill which is privately owned. Hall said the landfill takes waste from other states. In fact, 30 percent of the trash coming into the landfill is coming from out-of-state. Most New Hampshire trash is then shipped out of state. Since the pandemic, landfills in New York and Pennsylvania are filling up and Hall said there have been talks of sending New Hampshire trash out to Nevada. 

“There is a crisis in anything that isn’t being recycled, that’s being added to a landfill,” Hall said. Greenfield collects about 26 tons of trash a month. “The numbers get pretty big pretty fast,” he said. 

And in terms of recycled items, “We generate much more than what we can reuse,” Hall said. 

Darren Smith, manager of the Peterborough Recycling Center, reported a manageable holiday season. They were busy the day before Christmas and they had a rush after the holiday, but Smith said, “It was a pretty mellow season for the recycling center.”

Around the holidays, they saw more soda cans, beer cans, glass bottles and cardboard. They also saw more gift bags. 

But Smith didn’t notice as much wrapping paper as he had expected. Wrapping paper has to go in the trash because it usually has a plastic lining that cannot be recycled.

“It just gets wasted,” Smith said.

Peterborough Recycling Center is seeing much more cardboard and less mixed paper coming in, a trend Smith expects will continue, but it has caused the prices facilities pay for mixed paper to drop. 

In addition to packaging, many families have to figure out how to dispose of their tree. 

“Every other phone call I get is asking ‘Where do I put my Christmas tree?’” Smith said. Peterborough Recycling Center collects trees in its brush pile, which is eventually turned into mulch. 

Wilton Recycling Center also takes trees, some of which are given to goat farms. Greenfield Recycling Center also accepts trees in its brush pile.

But there are other uses for Christmas trees as well.

The Dublin Community Center is hosting goats and sheep from Amazing Grace Animal Sanctuary on Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon. People are welcome to bring their tree to the DubHub, where there will be coffee, cocoa and doughnuts and they can feed their trees to the animals. Other local farms like Meka Farm in Hancock posted on Facebook that people could drop off trees for their goats. 

The Boy Scout Troop 8 offers another option for disposing of  a Christmas tree. For the last several years, the troop has collected trees and thrown a bonfire. Sue Whitaker, committee  chair of the troop, said last year they collected about 58 trees. 

Whitaker said the bonfire is a “fun community event for people to go to.” She added that once people sign up for the Scouts to pick up their tree, they can attach donations to the branches.

“People give what they feel like they should give,” Whitaker said. “Some people don’t give anything, others give a lot.” Last year, they raised around $1,000 for the Boy Scouts, some of which went directly to the scouts who helped collect the trees.

The Boy Scouts used to hold the bonfire at Adams Playground in Peterborough, but will be holding it in Moosebrook Park in Hancock this year. Whitaker said the turnout for the bonfire can be affected by weather. Last year, it was so cold, people didn’t want to be outside, and if the bonfire has to be canceled, the Peterborough Recycling Center will take the trees. 

“It’s a really good fundraiser and a fun thing, too,” Whitaker said, “People look at it as a community service as well.”

The Boy Scouts are picking up trees Jan. 7 and 14. Those who would like to schedule a pickup can do so at docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfBZesk8ySQXUJYZa9cgVrMafD2VZOtXBnXV1QRJeI8Mkdm4g/viewform.

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