The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1901-04-12
a Model Sugar Bush.


country, who are so fortunate as to be
the owners of sugar maple orchard"
as it is sometimes called, and for the
city resident who knows nothing from
experience of the hard work which the
successful management of large sugar
bush means To be in the woods and
see the pals and buckets being filled
with the clear, sweet sap which the
tall naples extract in such mysterious
way from the cold, wet earth in which
they stand, and to smell the steam from
the big evaporating pans in the sugar
house, where fire big enough to run
small factory boiler makes the tenn
perature approach that required for
Turkish bath, all this is interesting to
most people and makes worth while
few words about one of the largest, if
not the largest, and best conducted
sugar bushes in Shiawassee county,
that of Mr.. A. B. Cook, situated four
and half miles south of the city.
The bush is all that there is left of
magnificent piece of timber which few
years ago covered a much larger part
of the southeast corner of section one
in Bennington, but still enough of the
woods was left to form grove with
about thousand maple trees in it, 1t
covers gentle slope leading down TO
the north toward the Maple river.
About eight hundred of the trees are
usually tapped and that is the number
which has required the attention of
three men on the busiest days of the
present season. The work of tapping
itself is no small task, each tap requir-
ing the boring of a small hole through
the bark and the driving of steel
Spite, or spout into the bark In the
hole made by the bit. The small
steel spout has notches for holding
the pail or bucket which is hung on 1t.
To keep eight hundred pals and spiles
in good condition is another task of no
small size, as may be imagined. Each
pail is kept covered with wooden
cover to keep out falling twigs. leaves
and insects The board covers are
painted on one side, so that as the men
make the rounds collecting the sap, by
reversing the covers in putting them
back on the buckets, they are able
to tell from the place where the team is
standing whether they have emptied all
of the buckets or not. The pals are
emptied into large galvanized sheet
steel tank which is completely covered
over with a conical or basin-shaped
cover which has two strainers in the
bottom TO keep any dirt from getting in.
The tank holds about three and a half
barrels and when filled makes good
load for the two horse team, mounted
as it is on sleighs rather than on wheels.
When the tank is filled and drawn
back to the sugar house the sap is
drawn off through hose attached to
the bottom of the tank and passes
through cloth strainer into still
larger receiving tank in the sugar
house. On day when the sap is run
ming freely it keeps the team and two
men decidedly busy if none is allowed
to waste.
After the sap is in the receiving tank
in the sugar house it is fed down to the
evaporating pans by valve automati'
cally governed by float, so that it keeps
the sap of the same depth in the pan at
all times and prevents any possibility
of its getting burned. AS the sap which
has been boiled most is the heaviest, the
pan is so arranged that it flows down
from one section of the pan to another,
getting heavier and heavier as it goes.
When it reaches the last pan and is
nearly ready to be taken out as finished
syrup it requires especially careful
watching to keep it from burning.
Even here the process comes near be-
ing quite automatic, for sap which has
almost become syrup flows in and
drives the last few pints of the finished
syrup along before it into the heavy
felt strainer which is necessary at this
point to separate the lime formation
peculiar to maple syrup which is not
properly treated. After passing
through the strainer the syrup is ready
to be canned and is turned at once into
the new gallon cans which are waiting
for it. Before it is run off through the
strainer howeverit has been tested with
a saccharimeter from time to time un-
til the proper density is reached. There
is therefore no possibility of the syrup
weighing less than the standard weight
of eleven pounds per gallon.
The boiling, seething, steaming pans
are an interesting sight, and in spite of
the open parts in the roof, the house is
so full of steam that it is almost i'm.
possible to see across it while the heat
is something to be remarked about. A
big furnace with large iron door in the
front runs under the entire length of
the pans, while the mouth of the furnace
is kept almost cboked with dry four
|