1 of 1

Write now Article Tools

In 1955 I married into a family of dairy farmers who happened to own a sugar bush. A sugar bush is not just a bush it is a name for a stand of maple trees that were harvested for their sap each spring in northern New York and this sugar bush contained 2800 maple trees so this was a big operation that netted a lot of money and a lot of barrels of maple syrup that was all sent to nearby Vermont at the end of the sugar season.

The sugar season started in late winter and ended in early spring during the days when the temperatures in the day time warmed up enough to make the sap run and the temperatures froze each night to stop it and that lasted from 3 to 7 weeks depending on the weather. The sap was gathered from early to mid morning when the sap ran faster.

Any tree over 10 inches in diameter was "tapped" at two to four feet above ground with a hollow metal spout hammered into the tree. Each spout had a hook on it unto which we hung a metal bucket. Each bucket had a small metal "tent" that covered it to keep any sort of debris from falling into it. During the early mornings the sap slowly dripped into the buckets, was collected by noon, and hung back up to collect the next day's supply of sap.

Each evening and night of frost stopped the sap until the next morning's thaw. Once the buckets were filled they were gathered up by our hired hands that drove a big horse drawn sleigh through the sugar bush that held a large metal vat. The buckets were emptied into the vat and returned to hang on the trees. The sled was then driven to the sugar shack that was a large bunkhouse type of place the men lived in during sugar season and in the middle was another large vat that had a long fire bed under it that was constantly fed a fire from start of sugar seasoning until the end. The men lived here all that time.

The sled driven vat was emptied via a long hose into the vat that sat above the fires. This vat has metal divisions in it and the inside men kept moving the sap around these divisions with boat oars that were used just for syrup making. This sap looked like clear water and was "boiled" down over a time period until it looked like maple syrup. Depending on the sugar concentration of the sap tells us what we can expect in syrup. Sap usually averages approximately 2 percent sugar and at this concentration it takes 43 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of syrup. Should the sap sugar concentration be higher then less sap was required to produce a gallon of syrup. We were always

• 1
• 2
• 3
• next page >>

Add your voice

Know something about Memoirs: Maple sugaring?
We want to hear your view. Write now!