Fentress Family Open Christmas Tree Farm For Season This Weekend

Live Christmas trees are ready this weekend in Fentress County with some six acres to choose from.

Sycamore Springs Farm Co-owner Lyna Pennycuff said she and her husband Joe began selling the trees in 2010 after retiring from teaching. Pennycuff said they believe the process of buying a Christmas tree should be more than just a chore.

“We think that it needs to be a family tradition to get together and when we have people and families coming to our farm, if you listen, you’ll hear families laughing and having fun and singing Christmas carols,” Pennycuff said.

Pennycuff said the dry summer and fall have posed an unprecedented threat to pine trees. The conditions have left the entire country with a Christmas tree shortage.

Pennycuff said the trees take some seven years to grow. The farm includes precut trees balled in burlap or planted trees for families to choose and cut themselves. Pennycuff said the farm also sells Fraser Fir Pines shipped from North Carolina that can not grow at the elevation of the Cumberland Plateau.

“It’s a win-win situation if you can have a real tree in your house,” Pennycuff said. “It’s renewable, that tree is going to be replaced and replanted, it’s beautiful, it smells wonderful, you’re cleaning up the environment, and you’re providing a good home for different wildlife species.”

Pennycuff said her husband has always had a passion for gardening. That passion has spread to the rest of the family and on most weekends, there are some 15 of them on the farm tending to and selling the trees.

“That’s our main love,” Pennycuff said. “Growing those trees, seeing the trees. It’s beautiful to look out and see those trees growing and the new growth and the wildlife that like to also utilize the tree.”