Maple syrup at the Hemlocks

Maple syrup at the Hemlocks

       Bottom line, it works

Now I am a slow learner. It only took me about three years to figure it out.  Mostly it was when to tap the tree.

There are two kind of maple trees on the Cumberland Plateau where the Hemlocks exists. One is "hard" maple (which makes good sap) and then there's "soft" maple, which does not work very well for sap collection.  I cannot tell the difference, but others can enough to where I trust them now when I identify them before the leaves come down in the fall.

And I have admit, I do use some New England equipment to help my cause, too.

Generally, one here should tap the tree earlier than they would imagine. Like January is a good time to tap. March is much too late up here, depending on the weather. That's my excuse for being a slow learner and crummy maple farmer. The recent really cold snap has thrown me a ringer, but all I can do is try and see if sap comes out of the tree. I intend to tap this month, anyway.  The tree sap is already rising, in my opinion. Trees still are getting ready to grow some more.

Now the sap is rather thin, like mostly water. The usual boil down ratio is 40 to 1 to make it into maple syrup. One usually wants to do this process outside, or have a really good exhaust system in their existing kitchen.  In the interim, one can boil it down to a lower ratio, like 20 to 1 to make an old style Indian Health Drink, or so the story goes. At least boiling does kill any bacteria.

Last, here is a wiki link on maple syrup:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maple_syrup

After that, good luck.