Seven years before Sydneysiders set out to pick up the perfect Christmas tree, farmer Lawrence Ranson is busy drying out pine cones and settling the seeds in for a fake winter.  “They have to think it’s winter for about six weeks in the fridge or they won’t grow,” Mr Ranson said. “Then we plant them out in the nursery, grow them for a year until they’re ready to go out in the fields.”  Mr Ranson then supplies seedlings to Christmas tree farms across NSW. Christmas tree farmers such as Greg Thomas at Kenthurst then plant the seedlings to save time in the farming process.  Mr Thomas plants more than a thousand radiata pine trees every year, beginning work as soon as he closes his gates for the Christmas season.  “It’s labour-intensive. There’s not a lot of IT involved,” Mr Thomas said. “It attracts me because it’s so bloody simple.”