Maple syrup production

By Michael Rosen

If there is one food that is quintessentially Canadian, it’s maple syrup. Sold at every Canadian airport, given as gifts to famous visitors, there is not much else that screams “Canada” like it. Unfortunately, the maple tree and its syrup (like the Canadian flag) are too often relegated as being an Eastern thing without people realizing that maples grow in every province and how easy it is to grow one and to one day make your own maple syrup.

In First Nations legends, squirrels licking wounds left by broken maple branches were the first indicators that the maple water may be sweet. Early explorers frequently mention maple syrup production by First Nations people and incorporated the practice, modifying it with buckets, spiles and wood-fired evaporators.

About 85 per cent of the world’s maple syrup is produced in Canada and about 90 per cent of that comes from Québec. Production is generally measured in the number of taps, since one large tree can have many taps. In Quebec official producers must have (wait for this) at least 10,000 taps! But there are many, many producers literally right across Canada—Ontario and the Atlantic provinces for sure but also Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and B.C.

I happen to be one of those producers with a grand total of 50 taps this year. Last year, my neighbour and I had 70 taps and made 37.65 litres of syrup or .537 litres per tap, which is way below the managed sugar bush average of 1 litre per tap. We don’t really manage the forest (I have one acre in the Gatineau Hills in Quebec) by spacing out the crowns and minimizing the poor producers and non-maples, and of the 50 taps on my property, only five are sugar maple.

Michael next to a 25-year-old red maple that he planted and has now tapped.

The others are red and silver maple whose sap is less sweet. Sugar maple (Acer saccharum) and black maple (A. nigrum) have the sweetest sap, at two to three per cent sugar. These are only found in eastern and southern Canada. Other maples, like Manitoba maple (A. negundo), red maple (A. rubrum), silver maple (A. saccharinum) and bigleaf maple (A. macrophylla) are found elsewhere and can definitely be tapped. Then there are the cold hardy cultivars of sugar maple, like the ‘Lord Selkirk’ or ‘Jefcan’ sugar maple that can grow in colder climes, down to Zone 3 as well.

The biology of all this is well studied but still remains a little mysterious. Sugars manufactured by the leaves the summer before (remember your biology class) are sent to the roots for storage. With the longer days and higher temperatures of spring the tree calls on these sugar reserves to initiate bud expansion and hence a new set of leaves.

When we tap the maple tree, we are technically tapping the xylem of the tree and withdrawing approximately seven per cent of the total sap. Maple trees will yield sap well into their 200th year with no long-term effects to the tree.

Tapping is traditionally done by drilling a 7/16-inch hole each year about 2½ inches deep in trees at least 8 inches in diameter. The number of taps per tree increases with diameter. Really big trees (25 inches diameter) can easily take five taps. Traditionally a bucket with a lid is hung from a spile that is driven into the hole. From there the magic begins! A welldrilled tap in a sugar maple tree can easily yield one litre of finished syrup during the season.

Looking down on a spile and bucket.

Sap being evaporated.

Taffy on snow. Boil the sap a few degrees above the syrup stage to get the right consistency.

Finished maple syrup.

But this is not without a huge amount of collecting and boiling. Because the sap can spoil on warm days, it must be collected daily and either kept cold or sent to the evaporator. The ratio of sap to finished syrup is about 40 to 1 with sugar maple, and with other species of maple up to 90 to 1, so the amount of boiling is tremendous!

Maple sap becomes maple syrup when the sugar density is 66.7-degree Brix (the measure of sugar content) or when the boiling point is four degrees Celsius above that of boiling water.

Today, there are many technological innovations for serious producers such as pipeline systems and reverse osmosis. But for us backyard producers the bucket and boil method (by wood fire or propane) will probably always prevail. Besides, what a great way to connect with our historical traditions, to celebrate our heritage, to connect with nature, to hail the return of spring and to pretend, in a limited way, to live off the land. And the friends you will make when they see and smell that boiling sap! Incredible!

So, enjoy the welcome of spring next year (it’s probably too late this year) by visiting a sugar bush with your friends or workmates, buying maple products, and plan in the future to produce the nectar of the gods on your own land, feeling proud to be a Canadian!