January Thaw - Excerpt from my book 1-26-18

MORE OLD TIMEY STUFF

January Thaw - Excerpt from my book 1-26-18

In New England from Pennsylvania north there is usually a January Thaw and alot of snow melts. The thaw arrived in February and that was when I let 'Ratty' the Muskrat go back to the pond.  The sap started running up the trees and we hauled out the buckets and things to collect sap to make maple syrup.

Books say that the Indians taught the colonists to make Maple Syrup... and Popcorn.. two of my favorite things.  The Indians invented Snow Cones.. no kidding!  They would put snow in birch bark cones and pour Maple Syrup on it and the syrup would crystallize and it was called "Sugar on Snow"  DUH  People still do it in New England today at sugaring time and all the tourists up north for skiing try it.

We had around 50 special buckets for sugaring.  They were shiny like milking buckets and had a hole to hang them on the 'spigot' and a sliding lid to cover them and keep dirt out. Spigots were heavy steel and about 3 inches long and one would bore a hole into a Maple tree and hammer a spigot in the hole.  Sap running up to the limbs would also trickle out of the tree into the bucket which would be nearly full by the next morning. Small trees were only given one bucket but big Maples usually had two, one on each side.  We hung all the buckets in one day.

Next morning Old Sam was hitched to a sled.  It was not really a sleigh like Santa has.. it was like a pickup body with a seat in front on runners.  In the back we put a bunch of shiny milk cans to collect the sap.  Each bucket held up to three gallons so we might have as much as 150 gallons of sap.

the encyclopedia says...
A maple syrup production farm is called a "sugarbush" or "sugarwood". Sap is often boiled in a "sugar house" (also known as a "sugar shack", "sugar shanty", a building louvered at the top to vent the steam from the boiling sap.

Maples are usually tapped beginning at 30 to 40 years of age. Each tree can support between one and three taps, depending on its trunk diameter. The average maple tree will produce 35 to 50 litres (9.2 to 13.2 US gal) of sap per season, up to 12 litres (3.2 US gal) per day. This is roughly equal to seven percent of its total sap. Around 25 gallons of sap with a 3.5 percent sugar content are needed to obtain one gallon of syrup :O  TAKES A LOT OF SAP  Seasons last for four to eight weeks, depending on the weather.

Making Maple Syrup was one of the big businesses of the family farm and would bring in more than 1/3 of our annual income so everyone worked their butt off!

We were small compared to others.  We had a "sugar Shack" the size of a garden shed and in it was the big rectangular furnace made of bricks.  On top was the shiny rectangular pan the size of a twin-mattress called the evaporator.  A wood fire was built underneath and sap filled the pan and it was cooked down until it turned to syrup and the amber color told us when it was ready.  While it cooked it was constantly stirred by a tool that resembled a hoe.. dragging front and back to keep it from burning.  This was Mother's job and step dad kept the fire going.  Uncle Ray and I hauled firewood and it takes a lot of it!  All the time it smelled wonderful.

Skinney Jimmy's father was the minister and they didn't have a "Sugar Shack" but they tapped trees and brought us their sap and we cooked it down for them for nothing. We did the same for Peter's family and they chipped in with loads of firewood which made it all okay.  While the sap was simmering there was free time to have awesome snowball fights.

Old Sam was still hitched and kindof bored so we took him up to the woods and loaded the sled with more stacked firewood, and to kill two birds with one stone we took our .22s in case we saw a rabbit or a squirrel and Bingo was immediately the hound dog professional and ready.

We left Sam and the sled parked.. Sam would stand till you told him to Gitup.. so we went looking for Rabbit tracks and found some right away and Bingo went off like a shot baying like a big hound.  He circled around and down came two snowshoe rabbits running fast and Peter and I both shot at the two of them at once... got 'em too!  We heard a noise behind us and turned.. and that is when we learned Old Sam could still run.

Old Sam weighed about 2200 pounds and had feet like dinner plates shod with iron and he was moving back down the wood road toward the sugar shack like a locomotive. That sled was like a twig behind him as he went and all three of us started yelling WOAH.. WOAH SAM... WOAH..  STOOOOOP SAM!  We might as well have been shouting at the wind.

Sam made it to the yard and past the Sugar Shack and kept on going.. right through the front yard and through Mothers snowed over flower beds and clean through her front fence like it wasn't even there.  There was the snap of giant breaking matchsticks as fence rails thick as your arm snapped right in two... and Sam... well he was headed down the road we took to go to school.  He wasn't even breathing hard.  It was downhill and we grabbed out Flyers and belly flopped and we were after him but he was around the bend already.  The road was hard packed and the Flyers flew and when we reached the straight we saw Old Sam still thundering along about a mile ahead of us.

We crossed the wooden bridge easily that was packed with snow and crossed the creek where I usually fished and saw that bobcat.  It was the same creek that left our field by my deserted island and wound its way, now icy cold.. toward the main road.  On the flat we had to walk and pull the sleds and we trudged and saw Sam getting closer.. he had finally slowed down but still walking.  WOAH SAM... WOAH... we yelled and he stopped and blew raspberries like he always did. He still wasn't even breathing hard.  Come to think of it, I never saw Sam breathing hard, 'cept one time when we were pulling out big stumps and then he barely broke a sweat.

We caught up and Sam turned his head and gave me one of those "Oh it's you" looks and I had to grin.  It was hard to feel cross at Old Sam he was just too lovable.  I fished in my jacket and found an apple and cut it in quarters and laid a quarter on my open palm.  Sam could bite my fingers clean in two.  He would wiggle his lips like Mister Ed and take that piece of apple so daintily that i barely felt the velvit of his nose.  When all four pieces were gone he checked my whole palm over with those sift lips to see ifthere was any more.  "That's all Sam" I said, "The last one.  Time to go home".

We threw the Flyers in the back of the sled and got up to ride.. normal again with Sam stopping to blow raspberries every hundred yards or so all the way home.

I looked at Peter and said "Man we are really gonna get it!"

"Show them the two rabbits!" offered Skinny Jimmy.  "Dumbass!" said Peter smacking him on the back of the head.

© Copyright 2018 by Daniel Blankley. All rights reserved.

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