Always enjoyed this time of year. I snowmobile in NH and ME but I have to drive thru MA & VT to get to the cabin and on the way in which I pass well over a dozen Maple Sugar locations that run miles and miles of tap lines and thousands of taps. But, along my way up, they have begun boiling their sap so I smell maple syrup for hours in my ride along with wood furnaces heating the boilers. Most of the locations are not retail, meaning public cannot stop in and buy a gallon or so. But one spot in VT has a restaurant, retail store and direct snowmobile and ATV access to the front door and this place bring in a lot of customers. Just love this time a year. Heading up tomorrow to NH so I will be stopping at this one location to get some more syrup. Beautiful cabin!!!
That sounds like a really fun drive up through MA and VT and the scent of syrup cooking just adds to the beauty. Have a great trip! And check back in with us as we're hoping to do a couple syrup giveaways in the next month or so. Maybe you can try out some WI syrup as well!
Just came upon your video to help me ID some of my trees for tapping. Really like the laid back discussion and friendly nature of the video. Subbed right away 👍
He might have mentioned Black Walnut, but I don't know that we've ever tried tapping them. Do you know the sap to syrup conversion on walnuts or birches?
Sugar maple gives you 40 gal of sap to 1 gal of syrup. Red maples are closer to 50:1. Still tastes heavenly. I think a bit more rich and flavorful. Birch I'm told is 100:1 and has a minty taste. I haven't done them yet. That'd be a fun little experiment.
Hard maple is rock maple is sugar maple. Highest sugar levels. I have trees in the 3 to 5 percent range. Most are about 1.75 percent. The higher sugar trees were experimental saplings from Cornell 40 years plus ago. Red maple has lower sugar levels and can influence the syrup taste. Some restaurants buy the hard/red syrup because of this. Birch and walnut can be tapped. But maple is unique in that we cut maple for its sapwood which is prevalent. Not so with birch and walnut. So drilling deep gets your spile into heart wood which is a waste of time. Birch syrup is good but it’s an acquired taste. I like it but then I am hard core Vermont maple. I have not tapped walnut as I am grooming them for veneer logs. I might try it but I don’t know yet.
Silver maple doesn’t have a lot of sugar, it’s really thin watery sap, silver maple also grows faster than other species. Inter mountain area has a lot of silver maples, not really a tapping tree, can do it tho
I'm not a tree expert by any means, but the bark looks like that on a Black Cherry (according to my Google search). My dad said we don't have any Poplar in the woods. Maybe different varieties look different?
Yup this summer I plan to identify mark and hopefully keep separated the red & silver maples. I’m curious what the red taste like ?? I hear the red maples have the lowest sugar concentrations 1-1.5% But next year I planning to run Ro system to get a majority of the water separated prior to evaporation.
@@GardenHands silver maple syrup tastes like corn syrup, nothing really exciting about it. Box elder sap is somewhat like sugar maple syrup taste wise, maybe has a tangy hint to it.
You have come a long way. You have a beautiful family and sugar shack!
Thanks Kris!! It certainly has been a fun hobby and a great way to make the winter go by faster!
Always enjoyed this time of year. I snowmobile in NH and ME but I have to drive thru MA & VT to get to the cabin and on the way in which I pass well over a dozen Maple Sugar locations that run miles and miles of tap lines and thousands of taps. But, along my way up, they have begun boiling their sap so I smell maple syrup for hours in my ride along with wood furnaces heating the boilers. Most of the locations are not retail, meaning public cannot stop in and buy a gallon or so. But one spot in VT has a restaurant, retail store and direct snowmobile and ATV access to the front door and this place bring in a lot of customers. Just love this time a year. Heading up tomorrow to NH so I will be stopping at this one location to get some more syrup. Beautiful cabin!!!
That sounds like a really fun drive up through MA and VT and the scent of syrup cooking just adds to the beauty. Have a great trip! And check back in with us as we're hoping to do a couple syrup giveaways in the next month or so. Maybe you can try out some WI syrup as well!
Just came upon your video to help me ID some of my trees for tapping. Really like the laid back discussion and friendly nature of the video. Subbed right away 👍
That's the best endorsement we've had! Really appreciate it! Stay tuned, we've started filming again, so have more projects coming in 2023.
Not sure if you mentioned walnut can be tapped. But like birch trees it takes a lot of sap to make a gallon of syrup a lot lol.
He might have mentioned Black Walnut, but I don't know that we've ever tried tapping them. Do you know the sap to syrup conversion on walnuts or birches?
@@GardenHands it’s like 80 to 1 I think
Yikes, that is a lot of sap needed and quite a bit more time to boil. Thank you!
I was waiting for you to say birch...lol.
BIRCH!!
Sugar maple gives you 40 gal of sap to 1 gal of syrup. Red maples are closer to 50:1. Still tastes heavenly. I think a bit more rich and flavorful. Birch I'm told is 100:1 and has a minty taste. I haven't done them yet. That'd be a fun little experiment.
Let us know if you try birch, we haven't done that.
Hard maple is rock maple is sugar maple. Highest sugar levels. I have trees in the 3 to 5 percent range. Most are about 1.75 percent. The higher sugar trees were experimental saplings from Cornell 40 years plus ago.
Red maple has lower sugar levels and can influence the syrup taste. Some restaurants buy the hard/red syrup because of this.
Birch and walnut can be tapped. But maple is unique in that we cut maple for its sapwood which is prevalent.
Not so with birch and walnut. So drilling deep gets your spile into heart wood which is a waste of time.
Birch syrup is good but it’s an acquired taste. I like it but then I am hard core Vermont maple.
I have not tapped walnut as I am grooming them for veneer logs. I might try it but I don’t know yet.
Silver maple doesn’t have a lot of sugar, it’s really thin watery sap, silver maple also grows faster than other species. Inter mountain area has a lot of silver maples, not really a tapping tree, can do it tho
Yes sugar maple have more sugar %, while reds, silver and box elders have a lower %.
Thank you! That's what we thought, but we aren't as familiar with those trees! Appreciate you watching!
Pineapple Rum tree.
Birch is very dark syrup and tastes like molasses and vinagrette
Interesting! Would be fun to do a comparison sometime.
3:00 is a Cherry tree? Really? Neither the appearance nor the description is what I have always heard and read about Cherry. Sounds more like Poplar.
I'm not a tree expert by any means, but the bark looks like that on a Black Cherry (according to my Google search). My dad said we don't have any Poplar in the woods. Maybe different varieties look different?
Silver maple are great for tapping lower sugar concentrations 2-3%
black walnut 🤢
We've heard silver maples are good, would be fun to compare the taste of them. We can leave the black walnut out of the taste test!
Yup this summer I plan to identify mark and hopefully keep separated the red & silver maples. I’m curious what the red taste like ?? I hear the red maples have the lowest sugar concentrations 1-1.5% But next year I planning to run Ro system to get a majority of the water separated prior to evaporation.
@@GardenHands silver maple syrup tastes like corn syrup, nothing really exciting about it. Box elder sap is somewhat like sugar maple syrup taste wise, maybe has a tangy hint to it.
Box Elder sap?
@@JohnAnderson-kt4mb