The Rural Voice, 1999-03, Page 24The fire is stoked regularly and
huge maple or basswood logs added.
Keeping the fire well stoked or very
hot ensures the sap will boil at an
even temperature.
Dry logs, three to four feet long,
are fed to the fire and the fire stoked
every 20 minutes or so to remove
coals and ashes. Sparks flying in a
wooden building near the edge of a
bush have to be watched and doused
or raked.
Boiling sap produces foam and
rising steam, another reason the fire
and sap can't be Tett alone to go out
to gather, for example.
Maple foam. threatening to spill
over the pans which stretch almost
the length of the shed, is controlled
by hand, with a few drops of milk or
vegetable oil, a trick Ed says he's
learned from years of experience.
After boiling for an hour and a
half or two hours, when syrup tested
by a hydrometer has a sugar content
or density of about 67.5 per cent, the
syrup is considered finished and
Maple syrup
time to tap a new market?
Whether its a good time to get into the maple syrup
business or not depends on how you look at the
current situation, says Ken McGregor of
Strathroy, secretary treasurer of the Ontario Maple Syrup
Producers' Association.
On one hand, Ontario has barely touched its potential for
maple syrup production. McGregor says 70 million taps are
possible but only about 1.1 million taps are set annually.
As well, the market price has been strong in the past
year because of a tight supply caused by a 1998 crop that
was only about 75 per cent of a normal crop.
On the other hand, western Ontario producers who may
have thought there was an opportunity to fill demand
previously provided by eastern producers hurt by last year's
ice storm, will probably find eastern production won't have
declined as much as expected. Despite worries about severe
damage to sugar bushes caused by trees breaking under the
weight of the ice, it is expected that syrup production won't
be much different this year than in the past.
In fact, if there is a reduction it might be in western
Ontario because of last year's drought, particularly in Grey
and Bruce Counties. If the area gets a good amount of rain
and snow over the winter, he says, the trees should be in
good shape. Because of the high amount of sunlight trees
received last summer, sugar levels should be high in the
sap. However, if the soil moisture isn't replenished,
producers may want to cut back the number of taps they are
putting into trees to allow them to recover.
As in other areas of farming, there are fewer and larger
maple syrup producers these days, McGregor says. While
there are still producers who are tapping a few trees as a
hobby, people who are serious about making it a business
are expanding, usually to have more than 1,000 taps.0
4, Tap into something
new for 1999
• QualiTech Foods Inc.
will be purchasing
Maple Sap
call for details
+ 519-368-3663 or
1-800-879-0541
Tiverton, Ont.
• We will pay to access, or tap
1►
your Maple bush.
20 THE RURAL VOICE