Maple Syrup Season

Details

Created on Friday, 20 February 2015 14:54

Written by Julia Rose

LYNDON-- Maple syrup season, otherwise known as sugaring season, already has some farms working hard. The season starts at the end of February going until April when the weather is cold at night but warmer during the day.

 Here in Vermont the maple season has two major events: the Vermont Maple Open House Weekend is on March 28th through the 29th, this is a good time to visit the more than 80 Vermont sugar makers. None of the sugarhouses are ever the same so it is always nice to visit more than one. Some of the sugar makers even offer tours of their sugarhouses and horse-drawn wagons. While other owners give out tastings of their products.

The next major maple season event is the 49th Vermont Maple Festival on April 24th to the 26th. This festival is in St. Albans where everyone will be celebrating all things that are maple, like for example entertainment, meals, demonstrations on cooking, and even a parade.

Here in Lyndonville Mike Johnson, owner of Happy Hill Farm, has already started the process of getting everything ready for sugaring season.

"Generally we start tapping around the beginning of February, we won't expect sap until the wether gets a little bit warmer. We should be getting sap around the mid to end of March and sap will run until about mid April."

Johnson has to tap over 15,000 trees, which will allow him to produce about 70 gallons per hour of maple syrup that he will then be able to sell in stores.

"We just pump it into our storage room," said Johnson. "We have 40 gallon stainless steal storage rooms and from there we will seal it hot and leave it there till we wanna bottle, or until we sell it to a bulk buyer."

This is only Johnson's 2nd year he will be harvesting the maple sugar but he already has plans for the nest couple of years to expand his business.