What goes where when you're sorting Christmas trash on P.E.I.

By the time you read this, you might already be awash in torn-open wrapping paper, demolished cardboard boxes and styrofoam whatnots from the Christmas morning frenzy.

Those of you who packaged family gifts in reusable fabric sacks and those pretty holiday gift bags are ahead of the game. You can just put those suckers back in a storage box, along with any sturdy bows and fabric ribbons, for re-use in 12 months' time.

Some of you might have taken a cue from a Japanese custom called furoshiki and tied up your gifts in attractive fabric sheets that themselves are a present to receive. Or you might have given your friends and relatives experiences rather than things, and have relatively little waste to contend with.

If you haven't, well, maybe next year.

In the meantime, here's a list of what to do with each kind of Rudolph refuse. You can also check out the extremely thorough Island Waste Management interactive sorting guide if you're wondering about something not on this list. There's an app called Recycle Coach you can download as well.

Wrapping paper

Plain or coloured paper goes in the compost bin, unless it has plastic coating or foil designs or embossing on it. Then it's waste.

Greeting cards

Greeting cards are compost unless they have plastic, foil, ribbons, or other types of embellishment on the cards, in which case the entire card goes in the waste.

If the greeting card has a battery to light up or play music, remove the battery and recycle it at a recycling collection location.

Christmas cards go in compost, unless they have embellishments like glitter or ribbon, in which case they are waste. (Neil Hyde photo)

Gift bags

If they're shiny with a plastic coating, they're waste. (Or saveable for next year; see above.)

However, Island Waste Management says you can recycle gift bags made of brown paper with brown paper handles. They can go out on the next recycling day, with your corrugated cardboard or in blue bag number one (paper items).

Brown paper packaging

Clean packaging of this type is recyclable, and can go out with corrugated cardboard or in a blue bag number one (paper items).

After you've unwrapped a few of your favourite things, brown paper packaging goes into recycling and the string in waste. (Environmental Defence)

Packaging material

Styrofoam packaging forms and peanuts are waste and go into the black bin. Same for plastic packaging forms that don't have a recycling number on them.

Pulp fibre packaging forms that look like the stuff that egg cartons are made of can go into blue bag number one.

Interestingly, some shippers are now using biodegradable packing peanuts made from naturally derived starches like wheat and cornstarch, especially for electronics. If that's what's in your gift box, test one by running water over it. A biodegradable one will start to break down within seconds. Then you can compost the rest.

Ribbons, bows and tinsel

Waste, waste and waste.

Ribbons and bows go in waste, and will end up in P.E.I.'s landfill or being burned at the Energy From Waste plant in Charlottetown. (Getty Images)

Tissue paper

Compost it, even if it has traces of glitter. Island Waste Watch said it will accept a small amount of contamination on paper -- but anything that has come into contact with food waste should be composted.

Bubble wrap

No recycling number on it? Put it in the waste. (After you've popped it, of course).

Boxboard

Think cereal boxes, frozen pizza boxes or folding gift boxes for sweaters — anything cardboard that is not corrugated cardboard, made of two flat layers of thin cardboard with the wavy layer in the centre.

Put boxboard in the compost, while its cousin, corrugated cardboard, goes into the recycling.

Wooden boxes

It might be tempting to put these wooden citrus fruit boxes in the green compost container, but don't. They go in the black waste bin.

If you have a clementine box, any unwanted clementines and their seeds and peelings can go in compost, though.

The empty clementine box goes in the black bin — unlike the clementine seeds and peelings, which go in the green bin. (Shane Hennessey/CBC)

Christmas wreaths and planters

If you don't want to dismantle them before tossing them, they are waste. If you separate the natural boughs from the wire  forms and hangers, and the ribbons and fake berries, the boughs are compostable and all the other stuff goes into the black bin.

Christmas lights

If there is a plastic cover over the lights, in a reindeer shape for example, and there's no recycling number on it, pull it off and put it in the waste. The rest goes in the recycling blue bag number two (plastic, metal, glass items) — bulbs or no bulbs.

If you can get the bulbs out, take them out and bring them to a Waste Watch drop-off centre for light bulb recycling.

If they won't come out, leave them with the string of lights and put them in blue bag number two (plastic, metal, glass items) for recycling.

Christmas lights can be recycled. (Tina Lovgreen/CBC)

Christmas tree

Here are the rules for whipping your discarded natural Christmas tree into shape for the curb: No ornaments or tinsel left on them, no tree heavier than 23 kilograms (50 pounds) or longer than 2.4 metres (eight feet). If it's longer or heavier than that, you should cut it in half.

Curbside collection starts the week of Jan. 8. Trees have to be curbside by 7 a.m. AT, and drivers are not able to come back to collect them if trees are not out in time. Keep in mind that trees may not be collected on the same day as your regular garbage pickup, so don't despair if yours hasn't been.

Make sure trees aren't stuck in or covered with snow or ice so that the crews can easily grab them as they go by.

A herd of goats can strip and eat a Christmas tree within minutes. (Liny Lamberink/CBC London)

Residential customers can also drop off their trees at Waste Watch Drop-Off Centres free of charge during January.

Several Island goat farms have registered for the IWMC Christmas Tree Program. Check out IWMC's list of registered farmers on its website, and arrange to deliver your tree directly to the farmer if you wish.

Another idea is to stick your bare tree out in your backyard to act as shelter for birds and other wildlife in the wintry months ahead, or cut the branches off to spread on flower beds to give perennial and bulb roots extra protection from deep-freeze temperatures. Then when you do your spring cleanup, add the dried-up branches to your yard waste for pickup.