Time For Maple Tapping In The Acadian Forest

After a cold winter, the weather in Nova Scotia's Acadian Forest is becoming perfect for tapping sugar maples. It won't be long before maple syrup is ready for selling at stands along the road to my home.

Sugar maple tree tapping occurs when days are just above freezing, and nights are just below freezing. Too cold and the sap stops, while temperatures too warm cause trees to begin leafing out, which affects the composition and taste of the sap.

Sugar maple sap contains about 2% sugar. Maple syrup, on the other hand, has about 67% sugar content.

Many people in my neighbourhood tap sugar maples and sell syrup, but the most extensive operation I have seen is in the Acacia Brook valley. 

Down there one finds a lovely stand of sugar maples, some of which are very large and old. Trees are not usually tapped until they are 20 30 years old.

Largely gone are the days that tappers hung metal buckets under taps on the trunks of trees. Today more efficient, but less visually pleasing methods are used.

In the bottom of this picture you can see the green and black tubing that transports the sugar maple sap to centralized collection points.

Plastic tubing connects the trees to central collection points. These points are ideally lower down on slopes where the groves of maples grow. They are also close to the sugar shack, where the sap is boiled down to concentrate the sugar content (and taste).

While the province of Quebec is the major maple syrup producer in Canada, and the world, Nova Scotia is the fourth largest, and has between 150 - 200 producers in operations of all sizes.

Get those pancakes and waffles ready. And remember, when you are pouring the syrup, to thank the trees. What a gift!