MAPLE-SUGAR 



MAPLE-SUGAR 



429 



Maple-sugar weather. 



Ideal sugar weather is met in the late winter or 

 very early spring, when it begins to warm up, 

 when the days are sunny and the nights still frosty. 

 The gradual northern spring in which the ground 

 yields up its frost but slowly is more likely to 

 provoke the repeated sap-flows, which make a suc- 

 cessful season, than the more frostless seasons of 

 more southern latitudes. Whatever the real cause 

 of sap-flow, temperature fluctuations from points 

 below to those above the freezing point, slight 

 though they may be, excite the gas tension in the 

 wood-cells if they occur before the leaf-buds get 

 well started. After that yearly episode in the life 

 of the tree, little or no sap flows, whatever the 

 vagaries of the thermometer. 



If at this time the tree-trunk is tapped with an 

 auger, an inch or two in depth, preferably on the 

 south side, and a sap-spout driven into the hole, 

 the sap flows. Convenience and economy alike 

 dictate tapping at breast height. The flow is 

 erratic, often exasperatingly so. It may run for 

 some time fairly continuously, but commonly the 

 flow is broken up into several distinct periods, or 

 "runs" as they are called, until the over-warm 

 weather of advancing spring swells the leaf -buds 

 and the "season" is over. Sap runs in the 

 daytime, rarely at night, and to any extent 

 only on good sap days. 



The sap. 



The sap as it first flows is crystal clear 

 and faintly sweet, carrying not only sugar 

 but also minute quantities of mineral matters, 

 albumens and gums; as the season advances 

 the flow lessens, the sap clouds up (owing to 

 exterior contamination of the pail or tap), ^^' 

 becomes slimy at times and the quality be- 

 comes impaired. Hence " first run " sugar or syrup 

 makes the best product. While highly variable, the 

 sap averages 3 per cent of sugar, together with 

 some other dissolved substances that are a nui- 

 sance to the sugar-maker. The sap is all through 

 the tree at this time, except in the dead heart-wood. 

 It is in twig and trunk, root and branch, and wher- 

 ever the tree in tapped the wound bleeds, if the 

 weather serves. 



of tank cars runs on a narrow-gage railway wind- 

 ing among the trees, past storage-tank stations to 

 which pipe lines lead from several sections of the 

 forest. 



The evaporator. 



When the gathered sap arrives at the sugar- 

 house it passes into the storage tank, from whence 

 it flows into the evaporator. This, the most costly 

 and elaborate implement of the sugar-maker's art, 

 is an outgrowth of the shallow iron pan which 

 began to replace the old-fashioned iron kettle some 



^^ 



Gathering the sap. 



The collection of the sap is no small task. Roads 

 or paths are broken out in the snow among the trees, 

 along which men and teams travel in gathering the 

 sap. There are several systems in use. The shoul- 

 der yoke is common in the smaller bushes, but the 

 gathering-tank or barrels on a bob-sled or stone- 

 boat are more often used, sometimes in conjunction 

 with the shoulder yoke. When topography favors 

 and the size of the plant justifles it, the pipe-line 

 system is used, a series of open troughs, or, some- 

 times, galvanized iron pipes running through the 

 various sections of the bush to the sugar-house or 

 to large storage tanks. The most advanced type of 

 gathering device is employed in a large Adiron- 

 dack camp, tapping, doubtless, the largest number 

 of trees under any one management, where a train 



650. m etfect of too much and too deep tapping. Also, a covered 

 sap pail; and current forms of sap spouts. 



fifty years ago. The original form was a single 

 shallow pan about two and one-half feet wide by 

 six to ten feet long, set on a fire-box of brick. The 

 sap was concentrated to a thin syrup, which was 

 poured out and the process repeated. By the use of 

 this device a more rapid evaporation of the water 

 was maintained, less wood was used and better 

 goods made. The lack of continuity and the neces- 

 sary interruptions of the process were an obvious 

 disadvantage. Necessity evolved the continuous 

 evaporator, into which a steady stream of cold sap 

 enters, passes through a devious course, boiling 

 furiously, and from which, periodically, the hot 

 syrup is drawn. 



The evaporator sits over a roaring wood fire 

 burning in a long brick stove or iron fire-box which 

 the sugar-maker terms the " arch." In some large 

 plants steam evaporators are in use. [An evapora- 

 tor is discussed in detail in the succeeding article.] 

 As the product leaves the evaporator it is not, as a 

 rule, in salable condition. It is usually safer to 

 draw the syrup from the evaporator before it gets 

 concentrated enough to sell. So it undergoes 

 further boiling in a special deep pan until the tem- 

 perature is about 219° or until it weighs eleven 

 pounds to the gallon, when (after the separation of 

 the "niter" or "sugar sand," — an impure malate 



