1. Check with your city / local recycling center
This happens to be a really easy task for me personally, even though I live in a one bedroom apartment, because Denver is totally prepared to take and use Christmas Trees. They have a Treecycling program where you can place your tree on your curbside or drop it off at one of their two facilities. The Christmas trees will be used to create mulch and compost for Denver's annual Mulch Giveaway and Compost Sale.
2. Check For federal programs
Tell City Ranger District employees prepare to install recycled fish habitat in an Indiana lake. Photo © U.S. Forest Service on USDA Flickr
There are dozens of state and federal programs around the country that collect Christmas trees and use them for habitat improvement and restoration projects.0
For example, the US Forest Service, US Fish and Wildlife Service, and US Army Corps of Engineers submerge and anchor Christmas trees to the bottom of selected ponds to provide habitat for juvenile fish.
Rather than submerging trees to create underwater habitat, they can also be placed along stream banks to stop erosion and help restore degraded stream banks.
3. Winter Mulch
Check to see if there is a tree recycling events where you can bring your live tree and have it be shred down to natural mulch that you can take home and use in your garden.
If shredding your tree isn’t an option, you can break off the needles, cut the branches into small pieces and use it as much. You could also use limbs to cover your garden beds, protecting them from frost.