Maple Syruping

On Saturday, Barkhausen Waterfowl Preserve had a Maple Syrup and Spring Celebration, despite the fact that the temperature was in the 20s at about 10 AM when we arrived.  As we checked in, we were organized into groups of about 30 for the program (we were sent to the green group).  Matt, Assistant Park Director and our tour guide, met us and led us to the first station along a 3/4 mile walk through the woods near the nature center.  The first stop included the legend of how maple syrup making began- to make a long and engaging story short, a guy left his hatchet stuck in a tree and the sweet "tree water" came pouring out into a randomly placed bucket below.  Matt told us about equipment used to "tap" maple trees (and really any tree that you would like to tap) and the important conditions necessary for sap to run- warm enough days around 40 degrees and cold nights below 32 degrees.  This freezing and thawing along with the movement of sugars to get the trees ready to produce leaves in the spring causes the syruping season, which may only last for a few weeks depending on conditions.  The "tree water" or sap (or "deer Kool-Aid" as Matt suggested) collected from a tapped tree is about 98% water and only 2% sugar.

Next, Matt illustrated how trees move water and sugars through the trunk with the kids in the group- noting the important jobs of the heartwood (strength), sapwood (movement of water and sugars), and bark (protection).  He also demonstrated how to tap a tree (he used an aspen as an example) and allowed the kids to help drill the hole for the spile (the spigot to allow the sap to drip in a collection bucket or bag).  The rule of thumb is one spile per 10 inches of diameter of the tree (e.g., a 20 inch diameter tree could tolerate 2 spiles).

Next we checked out the Doug Hartman Sugar Shack to see the processing of the tree water- basically a big metal vat over a fire all day to cook off the water and increase the sugar content of the remaining almost-syrup.  Once the almost-syrup gets close, most folks move it indoors to a stovetop to keep a very close eye on it as it boils down further.

Doug Hartman Sugar Shack at Barkhausen Waterfowl Preserve

 

After the walk, Matt took us back to the nature center where we heard about the final processing and bottling or canning.  Doug, a volunteer, told us that the final product is 66% sugar and 34% water, definitely much different than the tree water.  If you remove too much water from the syrup as it cooks, it will become maple sugar.  The best part was sampling some vanilla ice cream with Barkhausen-made maple syrup!  Delicious!

Forgot to take a "before" picture of the maple syrup drizzled over ice cream- too delicious!

The sugar maple is the state tree of Wisconsin, and maple syruping is very popular for homeowners and landowners, especially Up North.  We buy local maple syrup right from our grocery store, and many hardware stores sell all of the materials you would need to tap trees and collect sap in their own yard.  Barkhausen has about 100 trees tapped on the preserve, the sap from which they use to make syrup for their educational programs.  As you would imagine, it takes a lot of sap to make only a little bit of syrup!

To see an ABC News segment of the Barkhausen Syrup Celebration featuring Matt and Doug, click here.