tpeele@bayareanewsgroup.com

OAKLAND — What’s an elephant do with a Christmas tree?

Scratch its back.

Unless it’s hungry. Then, think wood chipper replete with ivory. Yup. Pachyderms munch fir trees.

Count scratching and chowing among the uses of the unsold trees still sitting on lots with Christmas morning looming. The short ones. The lopsideds. The Charlie Browns.

At least that’s where some of the leftover Noble and Douglas firs at Brent’s Trees will end up when the Oakland institution tucked under an elevated portion of Interstate 580 near Lake Merritt shuts down for the season, owner Brent Hennefer said Wednesday.

The Oakland Zoo’s elephants, Tule elk and giraffes love a good back scratch with a stiff fir. Lions and tigers like the scents. Keepers even hide peanut butter treats in some for giraffes to poke and root out, zoo spokeswoman Nicky Mora said.

At Hennefer’s nearly empty lot on Wednesday, the trees likely bound for the zoo stood against temporary fences as cars whizzed by on the overhead freeway. The ground was thick with pine needles as few customers wandered about.

The peak of the buying season was a few weeks ago, Hennefer said, when the line to the tiny, battered Aristocrat Land Commander camping trailer that serves as his office, stretched 20 people or more. By now, there are two types of buyers left — people who traditionally put up trees on Christmas Eve and those who procrastinate or hope prices might drop. They haven’t, at least here. A good tree is still going for $11 a foot.

Planning on a last minute 10-footer? That will be $110, please.

According to the American Christmas Tree Association, about 25-30 million cut Christmas trees are sold in the U.S. every year, with close to 350 million more growing on U.S. farms.

Inevitably there are leftovers, many of which Hennefer will donate to the zoo. Some, though, are headed for a fate worse than a hungry elephant — the chipper.

“Mulch,” Hennefer. “We have to do something with them.”

There’d be even more leftovers if Hennefer shut down when business slows. “I don’t even make enough to pay the workers the last week,” he said. “But I want to make sure everyone gets their tree.”

Even the elephants.

Follow Thomas Peele at twitter.com/thomas_peele. Email him at Tpeele@bayareanewsgroup.com