The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1872-03-07
Maple Sugar.


Maple Sugar.
One of our best farmers, dairyman whose
product always brings good price, and
breeder of fine blooded stock, recently re-
marked that the most valuable and best pay
ing land he has is his sugar orchard; and vet
hundreds Of Vermont farmers are chopping
down their naples to sell them for fuel to the
railroads or to residents of villages, realizing
not more on an average, than 50 cord on
the stump, and many not more than 81 a
cord 1t is difficult accounting for this, as
Tor great many other practices which pre-
vail among farmers, and we do not expect to
be able to do so; yet we hope to throw some
little light ON the subject.
There have been many and very great i'm
provements in the manufacture of maple su-
gar in the last twenty years, and these i'm
provements have been so prominently brought
before the public that it seems hardly possi
BILE that any should be ignorant of them. We
nevertheless see men essaying to instruct the
public through the press, and at prominent
agricultural gatherings, in the use of appara-
tus, which has been superseded among the
best informed and most enterprising of their
class, nearly score of years, and advocating
processes equally obsolete. There are men
In vermont who have made sugar more than
forty years with very slight improvement i'm
any respect, and who resist all the innoya-
tlons upon former methods, believing that
their product is sweeter because it is stron-
ger, not knowing and determined not to know
sC L. 81.
sweet as the unchanged and more delcately
navored cane sugar from which it is produced
by their unskillful process of manufacture.
we reeollect seeing within the last year or
TWO several newspaper articles upon this sub
Ject, indicating very clearly that Vermont
sugar makers are not alone In this respect.
Indeed on taking a second look, it seems quite
possible that they are rather leading in the
matter OF improvements, for nine-tenths of all
the valuable patents for maple sugar appara-
tus and appliances are of Vermont origin.
The sap of the maple when first drawn. is
an almost pure though very dilute solution of
cane sugar, the impurity consisting usually
OF very slight trace of tartrate of lime. 1t
is belived that instantaneous evaporation of
the water would give product of cane sugar
without so much as trace of the uncrystalli-
Fable or grape sugar; but as instantaneous
evaporation is impracticable, If not impossi-
gar which is not more or less degraded. The
natural tendency and every extraneous influ-
ence are toward degradation, as long as a par
ticle OF moisture remains in the sugar. and
the whole labor and skill of the intelligent su-
gar maker are employed in evaporating away
the water with the least possible exposure to
external influences, and of course in the
least possible time. To this end he selects
all his apparatus and conducts all his opera
tl0Da- He paII -.
his trees, and spout which protects the or
ifice from exposure to light and air. He uses
narrow, deep tin bucket, thoroughly scald-
ed whenever any appearance of souring is
diseernible, anG he is earnestly considering
the expediency of using covers for his buck
cts; indeed he may have already adopted
them. His gathering tubs and storage are
all scrupulously cleaned and thoroughly scald-
ed, and have close-ftting covers. At ey-
cry transfer his sap passes through flannel
stralners, lest single particle of some foreign
substance may be melting to fermentation.
he uses the "evaporator," whosesoever pat
ent it may be, that will convert his san into
syrup in the shortest space of time and with
the least reboiling. He does not in this oper-
alton treat his sap en- masse, but as composed
OF an infinite number of individual particles,
each OF which IS to pass into the evaporator,
De boiled, and pass out as syrup in the same
order. His syrup runs from the evaporator
on to thick flannel strainer spread out fat
upon the top OF his narrow bottomed syrup
tub, and percolates through it at leisure, ieay-
ing most OF the tartrate of lime, sometimes
called inter, upon the strainer When the tub
Is nearly full it is laid aside for a few hours,
that the little remaining tartrate, if there be
any, may be permitted to settle to the bot
tom, when the syrup is carefully poured and
"sugared OFF, in pan made for that exclu-
sive use.
There is no branch of farming in which the
difference between good and poor manage
ment is more apparent in the results, and we
have never known a case where the farmer
has not rendered the trees far too valuable to
permit their destruction for fuel.
In our OFF and ON experience of more than
thirty seasons in sugar-making, we have used
pretty nearly every kind of apparatus ever in
use to any considerable extent among sugar.
makers, and we do not hesitate to say that If
we were to-day possessed of sugar establish
ment, well fitted up with the apparatus in
common use, and that which is more COM
monty recommended by those who write for
the press on that subject, only the impossible
lty OF raising money to pay for it, would deter
us from fitting up entirely anew, even if we
had to throw away the old sour wooden buck
cts, and black, rusty iron pots and kettles.
We do not care to advertise the wares of the
manufacturers of apparatus, or We could fur
nish complete list economically adapted to
the method of manufacture indicated above.
Country Gentleman