SPECIAL CROPS. 24. 1 



augers, spouts, buckets, barrels, pans, etc., ready, have your 

 wood cut aud hauled to the " sugar camp." 



At the first sign of freezing nights, and thawing days, tap 

 your trees on the sunny side, two feet or more above the 

 ground, and if liable to be disturbed by animals, four feet above 

 the ground. Make a hole with a three quarter or one inch 

 auger, slanting upward, and not more than one half or three 

 quarters of an inch into the wood at first. After a few days, 

 it may be bored a little larger and deeper. " Boxing," or tapping, 

 with an axe, is unmitigated folly. Use wood spouts, which are 

 v;iy easily made of soft wood or elder. Select, every year, a 

 spot removed from the last year's wound. Use large buckets. 

 You will be much more likely to save all the sap. Four gal- 

 lon tin pails, if taken care of, are the best and most economical, 

 but common wooden pails answer a good purpose. Never use 

 large and small pans, tins, etc., for you will be likely to lose a 

 great deal of sap. The nails on which the buckets are hung, 

 should be pulled out at the close of the season. Keep every 

 thing clean. Collect the sap in tight barrels, and have a molas- 

 ses hogshead for a reservoir. This should, for convenience, be 

 set a little higher than the kettle or pans, so that the sap can 

 be^drawn into them steadily, by means of a faucet. If you have 

 used kettles in boiling sap, use them no more. Get sheet iron 

 or copper pans. You can make them yourself, out of stove 

 pipe iron. They save time and wood. 



A New Hampshire farmer says : " I have a brick furnace, and 

 sheet iron pans, the whole costing twenty dollars. My son has 

 done all the labor this season, at a cost of eight dollars. He 

 used one and a half cords of wood, and made twenty-nine gal- 

 lons of syrup, for eight days' labor." The sap, when boiling, 

 must be carefully watched, and not allowed to overdo. When 

 boiled in pans, it evaporates very rapidly^ and if not attended 



