The trees gradually catch the sands and make little ridges that build over time.
Parks Canada has found an interesting way to protect sand dunes using discarded Christmas trees.
Piles of old Christmas trees are stacked up along Brackley Beach to fill in what are known as blow out areas where sand has drifted away.
Washed away sand dunes in P.E.I.’s National Park. ((CBC))
Kim Grant is the public outreach officer with Parks Canada and says the trees act like a net catching the sand and help rebuild the dune.
“People are at the end of holidays putting these trees out at the bottom of their driveways for waste to collect. But what they don’t know is some of the trees have been ending up here and helping repair and protect some of our dune blow outs,” she said.
Grant says it’s rewarding work to watch the trees gradually catch the sands and make little ridges that build over time.
The dunes make for nice scenery, but also serve a purpose by protecting the P.E.I coastline and preventing erosion.
Parks Canada started the project a couple of years ago with tree donations from The Island Waste Management Corporation.
Parks Canada has had some success with this project before. In another location, they saw about a metre of sand accumulate last year.
Christmas Trees been used to restore Sand Dunes in Canada video
CBC News · Posted: Oct 22, 2014 9:45 PM AT | Last Updated: October 22, 2014