St. Maries business is part of family tree
Selecting that special Christmas tree at Forever Green Tree Farm near St. Maries comes with all the delight of an old-fashioned Christmas – sleigh rides, hot chocolate and cookies and a bonfire to keep you warm.
Owners Margie and Larry Cooke know a little something about growing Christmas trees. Three of their trees were chosen and placed in the White House in 2003 as companion trees to the Capitol tree, which was selected from the Boise National Forest.
Larry Cooke says he was asked to donate some trees to the White House. But, according to the 2003 Capitol Holiday Tree Web site, “Selecting these trees is a monumental task that requires involvement of elected leaders, businesses, organizations, students and citizens.”
The Cookes won the Idaho Tree Farmer of the year award in 1989. They manage 100 acres with 20 acres dedicated to Christmas trees and a ball-and-burlap nursery.
The Cookes founded the St. Maries operation 20 years ago with the intent of selling small Christmas trees to families and businesses. Today they are involved in the community with a two-day environmental education program with sixth-graders.
“The goal,” says Larry Cooke, “is to realize you can work in the natural environment, make a living and still being caretakers of the land.”
The Cookes spend the majority of the year prepping the trees.
“It is a lot different managing Christmas trees, compared to managing timber trees for production,” he explains. “The Christmas tree is about beauty and cosmetics,” and he spends a lot of time trimming and shaping each tree.
In the six to 10 years it takes to grow a Christmas tree, the Cookes probably visit that tree about 100 times. Larry Cooke says he starts shearing and shaping the tree in its fourth year, and is constantly testing the soil to see how much and what kind of fertilizer it requires.
The Cookes hired three high school boys to harvest trees for wholesale buyers before Thanksgiving. Larry Cooke oversees the cutting of each tree and the hauling of it to the truck. “Today there is snow on the ground and the boys are allowed to drag the trees back to the truck,” he explains. “Otherwise it would take two boys to carry the tree as not to get the tree dirty.”
The Cookes grow mostly Grand fir.
“The market demands Grand fir,” Larry Cooke says, “because it is a native species, smells good and it grows well.”
Eight years ago, the Cookes toured a tree farm in North Carolina to see if they could raise Fraser firs. Although the Idaho climate is different, Larry Cooke believes the trees have adapted well. Next year will be the first harvest.
Margie Cooke is involved with marketing the trees, working with the community, and the environmental program for sixth-graders that her husband and Tom Smith, a forester with Potlatch Corporation, started 12 years ago.
A committee of public and private agencies oversees the education program now. Besides camping and telling ghost stories, the students get a tour of national forest land and get to visit the largest emerald garnet mine in the United States.
The farm remains a family business. Margie Cooke and her three daughters, now all married, help run the Christmas shop. The sons-in-law also help with the harvest. Their only son, now in the Navy, “still calls me and wants to know a blow-by-blow account of what’s happening,” Larry Cooke says.
The Cookes recently started a joint venture with their eldest daughter and son-in-law in Moscow to expand the tree farm. They bought 63 acres of crop and will begin planting more trees this spring.