Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1890-03-31
Maple Sugar and Syrup.

people imagine. Although the 1901
ish people of the country are cutting
for firewood every year thousands OF
trees that would yield a handsome
revenue if rightly managed, the prod
uct is still more than 60,000,00 lbs.
a year, or say nearly one-fourth as
great as the product of cane and sor-
ghum sugar of the whole country.
Vermont alone produces about 4 ,OO0,-
600 yearly, of which the largest part
comes to New York city. Although
no record of the amount handled in
this city in a year is at hand, it is
safe to say that more than 12,000,-
600 pounds are receivrd here every
season.
Next to Vermont comes New York
as a sugar producer. Ohio, Michigan,
Wisconsin and New Hampshire fol-
low. The hard or sugar maple -four
ishes best in cool climate, the West
ern Reserve in Ohio being the best
sugar region in Ohio. Taking one
thing with another the Western Re-
serve people have the sugar business
in better shape than any other people
in the country, for they have learned
how to cultivate and improve the su
gar bushes New trees are planted
as fast as the old ones die. Care is
taken in planting these trees to place
them so they will produce the most
and best quality of sap,and when the
sap is obtained it is boiled in an APP
paratus especially well designed to
produce clean and pure sugar.
If farmers only knew it they could
get more money out of an acre of SUI
gar trees than out of any crop raised
on the same land. The best sugar
bushes are on fairly moist land that
slopes to the south. An acre of land |
will support thirty healthy trees. A
much larger number will thrive on an
acre, but the larger number will pro-
duce less sugar than thirty will.
am not sure but twenty-five would be
q more profitable number to put in
that space, for it is we'll known that
the quality of the sap from trees
standing too close together is thin.
Even when trees are thick, if the soil
is moist abundant sap may be had,
but the sap is like milk from slop-fed
cows 1t takes between four and five
gallons of good sap to make gallon
of syrup in a proper apparatus, and
a gallon of syrup will make eight lbs.
of sugar. But where the sap is thin
it will require double the amount
sometimes more than double-to pro-
duce the same quantity of sugar.
In well ordered bush of thirty
trees to the acre the product, taking
one year with another, will run not
much below ten pounds of sugar to
the tree. The ordinary bush that re-
ce1ves no care and is tapped in ignor-
ant fashion, will produce not more
than three pounds to a tree. The
product of the well ordered bush can
be set down, therefore, as three hun
dred pounds of sugar to the acre, for
Eg Ah t the taahbme fa0na f Et q h On ffks
ground where it is made. If he got
SO or S12 an acre for hay from the
same ground, or say So for oats or
wheat, he would think he was getting
rich hand over fist. At the same
time the labor of making a crop of {
sugar would be much less expensive t
than the work of making a crop of ,
oats. 8
The best apparatus for making ma f
pie sugar from the sap is the ordina-
ry condenser used for making con- i
densed milk. On the Western Re- K
serve they have condensed milk fac S
tory where milk is handled during the s
regular milk season. Formerly this S
factory stood idle in cold weather, Jun o
til say the first of May. But now e
along at the end of February the far S
mers begin to tap the trees in the SUI
gar bushes. The taps are iron spiles b
driven into a half-inch hole. The Il
sap runs into covered pals made for b
the purpose. 1t is gathered from the h
pals into milk cans and driven from W
The bush to the factory, where it is O.
weighed as milk IS. The sap is then d
boiled in a vacuum condenser 1t h.
comes out the most beautiful syrup D.
imaginable. The farmer gets his n,
of this syrup less per-
,entage for boiling. The syrup sells W
eadily at the factory at S1.5O gal D,
on; ordinary syrup brings from 81
o S1.1O. ~
The modern sugar bush, if of any rel
xtent, requires quite little capital. NV
The spiles are steel tubes, and the nu
'ails are useful for nothing else. A W
ouse must be built to cover the boil all
ne pan. The boiling pan must be
ct in brick furnace in such a way
hat no direct fame reaches tin Ce
act it ought to be set in a sand bath, IN
0 that the syrup can never burn. "
here must be a big tank in this I'll
ouse to hold the sap, and a number uE
tin pipe lines should be laid from WI
to other tanks at convenient points III
/ the bush, SO that the sap can be de
IN, instead of carried, into the TO
ouse. 1t is customary to gather the We
up in barrels placed on a sled, which Tic
horse draws through the bush, but 10
lis is wasteful, for much sap is spill yo