© 2017 friends of grand rapids parks
Stay up to date with our monthly newsletters, and subscribe at the bottom of the page to have them delivered to your inbox each month.
December 2018
November 2018
October 2018
September 2018
July 2018
June 2018
May 2018
April 2018
March 2018
February 2018
Every year when the weather starts to warm up Michigan our trees start to come back to life. In Michigan and across the wooded North the flowing of Sugar Maple sap is the first signal of warmer weather and that spring is on the horizon. We are currently in the middle of the Michigan sugaring season and so it is a perfect time to learn some more about one of the oldest traditions in Michigan.
The first signs of spring in Michigan are always sweet — but there’s none sweeter than the return of maple syrup season. In honor of Michigan Maple Syrup Weekends (the first of which, for 2018, happens March 17-18), expand your knowledge of this “pure Michigan” goodness with the following little-known facts.
By far, Vermont leads the nation in the making of maple syrup — churning out a record 1.9 million gallons of the stuff in 2016, and accounting for nearly half the U.S. supply of maple syrup every year. Michigan is always in the top 10 U.S. producers, averaging around fifth place.
Bob Battel, field crops educator for Michigan State University Extension, said that only three to five percent of Michigan’s sugar maples — the primary tree used for maple syrup — are currently being tapped. “We have enough trees to outproduce Vermont,” he said. “It’s an underutilize resource.”
In late winter, when stored food is running low, savvy red squirrels have been known to use their teeth to score the bark of sugar maple trees, letting the sap ooze out. The liquid eventually evaporates, leaving a sweet, sugary trail that the squirrels can then lick for a little treat. Not exactly the same thing as warm, oozy maple syrup drizzled over pancakes or waffles, but pretty smart nonetheless.
No agricultural crop comes earlier in Michigan than maple syrup does. The maple harvest traditionally begins in late February or March — though during warm winters, tapping might start as early as January (which it did during winter 2017).
Native Americans living in the upper Great Lakes region (ie, Michigan before it became “Michigan”) were tapping maple trees long before European settlers moved in. Written accounts of maple sugaring date back to the 1500’s.
Neil Blake | MLive.com
First, temperature matters: Warm-ish days and cold nights stimulate sap flow in the tree after a sluggish winter. You probably already knew that. But there’s another reason: Once the branches begins to bud, the sap takes on a bitter flavor, and the syrup loses its sweet taste. The season usually lasts about six weeks, but the heaviest sap flow might only last between 10 to 20 days.
Emily Mesner | Mlive.com
The short season and the precise weather that must take place for its production would be enough alone to make maple syrup a precious commodity. But add to that the fact that it takes roughly 5.5 days for the average maple tree to produce 40 gallons of maple sap — which boils down to make just one gallon of syrup — and you can see why maple syrup averages roughly $40 per gallon.
Emily Messner | MLive.com
Sugar maples aren’t the only trees whose sap can be tapped and then boiled down to make syrup. Birch, black walnut, and even pine sap have been used to make syrup, though different trees impart different flavors, and some have even less sugar content than maples. For instance, birch syrup requires twice as much sap per gallon as maple syrup, and it costs three to four times the average cost of maple syrup — which could be why there are no large commercial birch syrup producers in Michigan.
Emily Mesner | MLive.com
The type of hardwood forests that sugar maples typically grow in cover more than five million acres in Michigan — their foliage, which turns red, yellow and orange in the fall, is partly what makes this state so pretty in autumn.
Heather Khalifa | MLive.com
Climate change is already affecting the maple syrup industry in Michigan, with increasingly earlier sap runs. and could impact it further. Battel said some maple syrup producers also worry about invasive species that could move into Michigan as a result of climate change, such as the Asian longhorned beetle.
Latara Appleby | MLive.com
© 2017 friends of grand rapids parks
© 2017 friends of grand rapids parks