We’ve made some expansions here on the farm in the last year. We completed an addition on our sugar house, and we’ve welcomed a third generation sugarer to our family! Maeve was born April 19th to Wheeler and Michael. We were scurrying to ship out cases of syrup last spring in the weeks before she was born. We could go on and on about the joy this sweet girl brings us, but we will stick to topic and tell about our farm news.
The expansion of the sugar house was completed last summer. Many thanks to Nate Gardiner for his prowess in the construction of the new addition. Nate and Michael built a 224 square foot addition to the back of the sugar house creating a storage room, a heated room for the new reverse osmosis machine, and expanded roof and platform area sheltering the 340 gallon tank that feeds the evaporator.
The addition of the reverse osmosis (RO) machine is the last major tool we will need in our bag of tricks making maple syrup. The RO machine is a filtration system that removes a quotient of pure water from the sap, leaving us with higher sugar content in the sap before we even begin to boil. It reduces our carbon footprint by more than half (yay! for less firewood), it speeds our boiling time and makes it possible to expand the number of trees we can tap in the future. This is a standard piece of equipment on large maple farms, and something we have had our eye on for the past 10 years. It’s a big win for us in the sugar house!
Wheeler and Michael, with the help of Mallory Michael, began tapping the trees on January 27th this year. There was still a frozen crust of snow when we began, and we took advantage of that by putting crampons on our boots and tackled the steepest sections of the forest. The crampons plus hard snow made for great traction in the steep ravines. We got through more than half of the taps on the first day, but then we were pressed indoors by snow and a deep freeze for a few days, and wrapped up tapping when temperatures warmed with the help of Thomas Carlson who flew in from Oklahoma to help us kick off the season. Thanks Mallory and Thomas for tromping around in the woods with us!
This past week we made our first syrup of the season. It is light, golden and delicious! The earliest syrup is always the lightest in color, and most delicate and mild in flavor. As the season progresses, the syrup darkens and the flavors become more complex and maple-y.
If you are interested in purchasing syrup this year, then you should subscribe to our newsletter. Subscribers will get first dibs on syrup when its available. We will have three release dates for syrup TBA in the newsletter this year. Don’t miss out! The syrup goes fast.