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“It’s just another little loss for the agricultural landscape and the farming tradition,” said Frank Pinto, director of the Morris County Preservation Trust. “It also requires one to go further for a tree or to buy one that’s imported from Pennsylvania.” A sizable chunk of the original Simonson Farm in Cranbury also went to a developer in 2002 when brothers Ray and Edward Simonson had different ideas about what to do with the nearly 300 acres they owned jointly. Rodger Jany, grandson of Ray Simonson, now keeps a smaller version of the Christmas tree farm on the portion he owns with his mother and aunt.

“Everybody (in his family) has been appreciative of development and how it helps maintain land value ... however, on the other hand, we also appreciate the open space,” Jany said. Anne Edwards, president of the New Jersey Christmas Tree Growers Association, said her members face the same pressures all farmers are experiencing as they age: a lack of younger family members willing to continue the tradition. In New Jersey, the situation is exacerbated by high land prices and proximity to growing suburbs. The average age of farmers is going up, and we’re just not getting enough young people taking over,” said Edwards, who with her husband owns the Edwards Christmas Tree Farm in Wrightstown.

Some Christmas tree growers liken selling out to developers to selling a member of the family. A number have chosen to instead enter the state farm-preservation program, which pays farmers to never develop their property. Once development restrictions have been written into the deed, farmland becomes less valuable, making it easier for a prospective farmer to enter the business, said Mark Vodak, a Rutgers extension specialist who sits as a non-voting member on the board of the Christmas Tree Growers Association.

That’s how Jeff Sangello, a landscape business owner, said he was able to afford to buy the Anne Ellen Christmas Tree Farm in Manalapan, whose previous owners contemplated selling to a housing developer. On Nov. 13, with money kicked in by the state and Manalapan, Monmouth County bought two agricultural easements on the 104 acres for $1.6 million. “The farm is entering our farmland preservation program just as it begins its busy seasonal time of harvesting evergreen trees,” said Freeholder Deputy Director Lillian Burry. “Because of the efforts by these preservation partners, future generations will be able to choose and cut their own Christmas trees, and 104 acres will remain a positive part of our ecosystem.”

John Perry, co-owner of Yuletide Christmas Tree Farms in Plumsted, said he and his younger brother Alan are trying to get their 24 acres into the Farmland Preservation Program to help keep the farm in the family. At 64, Perry said he doesn’t have decades of farming left in him. There’s a very real chance his heirs wouldn’t be able to afford the inheritance tax on the Ocean County land without farmland preservation, he said.

“The nice part of it is you’re still on it. You can still farm it. It doesn’t turn into a wheat patch,” he said. Despite preservation success stories, Richard Obal, agricultural agent with Rutgers Cooperative Extension in Monmouth County, said he’s seen more Christmas tree growers get out of the business than ones starting up. It’s tough work and an economic hardship tending trees that aren’t harvested for as long as 12 years, he said.

“Is it a growing industry in New Jersey? I would say not,” he said. “It’s all economics. It’s a crop that’s got a shelf life.”