History and production tour:
Page 3

To collect the sap, syrup producers used horses or oxen to draw a wagon carrying large barrels. At each tapped tree, the buckets were emptied into the barrels and placed back on the spile. Eventually, horses and oxen were replaced by farm tractors that were able to pull larger loads.

While the bucket collection method has some advantages (for example, it is possible to measure exactly how much sap individual trees are producing), it is time-consuming, hard work, and contributes to harmful soil compaction as animals and equipment repeatedly travel over forest grounds. Many producers now use plastic tubing that drains sap from trees directly into sugar houses or storage tanks.

Once the sap is collected and brought back to the sugar house, the boiling process begins. Sap is placed in containers over a heat source (such as the open fire pictured here), and water is allowed to evaporate. Sap becomes maple syrup when enough water has boiled off to leave a sugar concentration of about 67%.

Open Fire

Early syrup producers may have placed hot stones into hollowed-out logs containing sap, though metal containers eventually replaced these logs.

Boiling in a single kettle usually resulted in dark, low-grade syrup. Producers discovered a better technique involving the use of a series of kettles. In this method, pure sap is added to a kettle, is boiled down for a time, and is then poured into a second kettle. The process is repeated, with fresh sap never being added to partially boiled sap. Eventually the sap in the second (or third, or more) containers reaches the sugar concentration of syrup. This technique produces lighter, higher-grade syrup.

Modern evaporators developed from the use of a series of kettles, and operate in much the same fashion. These evaporators produce higher quality syrup more efficiently than open kettle systems.