Purple grackles, goldfinches, sparrows, house finches, and cardinals 
impatiently took turns dining on sunflower seeds outside Hub Brown's window while he and I gabbed about the good old days. His old days are a bit older than mine and his information and experiences are usually more interesting.  

 We swapped maple syrup producing (sugaring) stories after I raved about the delicious syrup my husband recently purchased from a Berkshire farmer. Hub's keen sense of humor and recollections from the past inspired this article.

 Always resourceful and energetic people, the Browns decided to put considerable 
effort into making maple syrup during the depression years. Purchased sweeteners were a luxury, whereas sap from sugar maple trees lining neighborhood roads was free as long as you got permission from landowners.

 Sugaring is done in late winter when day temperatures rise above freezing and night temperatures drop below freezing.  Hub and Agnes (Ag) drilled holes in the trees, hammered in taps (spiles), hung covered metal buckets from a hook on the spiles, and waited for the sap to flow. Ag regularly collected raw sap and dumped it into two large containers "that fit just right in the trunk of her car; you could even close the trunk lid."  A piece of felt cut from an old hat was used to strain the sap as it flowed into large kettles.

 Back then most people boiled sap outdoors to evaporate excess liquid, but Agnes wanted to use her kitchen woodstove. All seemed to be going well, the sap was getting thick, and Ag was self-satisfied. Her mood quickly changed when she noticed heat and moisture were causing the wallpaper to slide onto the floor. I can almost hear her now!  

 Hub tells of a neighbor who boiled sap in a huge old iron kettle hung over a fire. Wood was the traditional fuel source but this man burned used tires.  Hub chuckled that "Thick miserable black sooty smoke would fill the sky and cover the man - what a sight!"   This type of recycling was accepted back then, but nowadays environmental police would put a stop to that.

 In the 1970's, "The Mother Earth News" self-sufficient philosophy monopolized my life. Enthusiastic about producing our very own maple syrup, but basically ignorant about the sugaring process, we drilled holes, hammered spiles, and hung plastic buckets on some maple trees below our home. Eager to collect sap and make syrup, I regularly trudged down and up the snowy hill to find empty buckets.  Finally the flow slowly started but I couldn't stomach the idea of using insect-infested sap. We rigged covers for the pails and accumulated enough clean sap to fill large pots.  

 In the kitchen hunkered over the electric stove, I stirred the boiling sap 
and marveled as the liquid continually evaporated. Happiness turned into confusion when the pots boiled dry - where was the wonderful syrup? We later discovered it takes at least thirty gallons of sap to produce one gallon of 
syrup and not all species of maple trees produce sap suitable for sugaring. On the positive side, our kitchen walls were plaster and brick.   

 There are quite a few enterprising people in Tioga County producing significant amounts of maple syrup, maple sugar candy, maple cream and other incredibly delicious natural treats. They range from families making a few gallons for personal consumption to operations that ship surplus syrup out of the area. This takes place in our own back yards, so to speak, but most of  us aren't aware or don't make the effort to seek locally-produced items that would help support our county's agricultural economy and the people who work hard to feed our families.

 During a telephone interview the farmer from whom we bought the wonderful syrup patiently educated me about the maple industry. I was suffering from numerous maladies and couldn't take him up on his kind offer to witness the process first-hand. As they say, there's always next year.

 Mr. Leonard has been sugaring for most of his life. His children and grandchildren have become involved and he hopes they will keep the tradition going through future generations. Most farmers love their way of life and generally hope their offspring will continue in their footsteps.   

 Unfortunately, negative economic impacts often make it difficult or impossible to continue unless you don't mind losing money doing something you love. 

 Over the years sugaring processes have evolved but certain procedures remain constant: maple trees are tapped, sap is collected, excess liquid is  evaporated to create a thick consistency, syrup and specialty products are  packaged and perhaps sold to compensate for production costs and to earn some "mad money."    Sap collection methods have evolved from metal spiles and buckets to sanitary closed-system plastic spiles and tubing that direct raw sap to huge stainless steel vats and tanks.  Evaporating equipment has generally been fueled by wood, although some producers have converted to natural gas or oil-fired burners.  Unfortunately, the convenience of fossil fuels came with a steep price this year as energy prices soared.

 Mr. Leonard's best season produced seven-hundred gallons of finished syrup; he says 2003 was the poorest season in his sixty-one years of sugaring, producing less than three-hundred gallons of syrup. The first nine-hundred gallons of raw sap collected this year produced only nine gallons of finished syrup - a ratio of one-hundred gallons of sap to one gallon of syrup - normally it takes thirty or forty gallons of raw sap to produce one gallon of  syrup. A warm spell delayed good quality sap flow until March 7 whereas in 2002 sugaring started February 7 and produced five-hundred gallons.   

 Hopefully the next time my teenager asks for pancakes and syrup when I'm  exhausted and ready for bed, I'll haul out the frying pan with minimal grumbling and mentally thank those people just down the road from you and me who work very hard to provide such a wholesome way to satisfy a growing boy's sweet tooth.