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Are you playing offense or defense in the woods?

Will Brigham, Senior Sales Engineer at Farmblox | September 23, 2025

St. ALBANS, Vt.—Over the past several years, I’ve had the privilege of walking hundreds of miles of tubing with maple producers across the northeastern United states and Quebec, as well as at my own family farm in Vermont.

From family-run sugarbushes with 1,500 taps to commercial operations running over 100,000, I’ve noticed one recurring theme: most producers have historically been playing defense against tubing system issues and operating in reactive mode.

Vacuum leaks, frozen main lines and wildlife damage aren’t new problems - they’re part of the job.

But what’s changed is the scale and urgency.

With labor shortages and unpredictable season length, producers can’t afford to operate reactively waiting for tubing issues to show up on the vacuum gauge.

Yet that’s exactly what many were doing: Notice low vacuum at the pump, send someone into the woods to attempt to isolate the leak or leaks, hope they find the issue as soon as possible before too much production is lost. Repeat.
[ MORE ]

How color and flavor determine quality in syrup

Les Ober, OSU Ext. | September 23, 2025

BURTON, Ohio—The requirements for USDA Grade Maple Syrup are a density of not less than 66 brix and not over 68.9.

This may vary by state of origin.

The sample must be clear not cloudy. What about Color?

It has been used to identify the different grades from the beginning.

Is this the most important grade characteristic? What about flavor? Flavor often sells your product and is very important to the consumer.

Does that make Flavor more important than Color? Because they are often considered to be interrelated, the answer to this question is often up for debate?

Let’s take a “Deeper Dive” into the role that Color and Flavor play in determining the quality of pure maple syrup.
[ MORE ]

More results on 1/4 and 3/16 spouts from Cornell Maple Program

Adam Wild, Director Cornell University Uihlein Maple Research Forest | September 23, 2025

LAKE PLACID, N.Y.—For the past four years, we have been testing impacts on sap yield when tapping with a smaller diameter tap hole at Cornell University’s Uihlein Maple Research Forest in Lake Placid, NY.

New to report this year is two years of data with 3/16” diameter spouts.

Having a smaller diameter spout has the potential of creating narrower compartmentalized wounds within a tree.

This is beneficial for trees that have been tapped for many decades and trees growing on marginal soil or short growing seasons.
During the four maple seasons of 2022-2025 we tested sap yield from 5/16 (0.3125) inch diameter tap holes and 1/4 (0.25) inch diameter tapholes.

[ MORE ]

Bear rummages sugarhouse for syrup and eats syrup

Peter Gregg | September 23, 2025

WILLIAMSBURG, Mass.—Making maple means dealing with wildlife from time to time, but typically that happens in the woods, not the sugarhouse.

Sugarmaker Paul Zononi lost a couple gallons of syrup to a bear with a sweet tooth, after one snuck into the sugarhouse this spring.

“I get to the sugarhouse one morning and there’s syrup all over the floor,” Zononi said.

He had left a back sliding door open to load firewood and that is how the bear got inside. [ MORE ]

Quebec crop second biggest on record in 2025

Peter Gregg | June 17, 2025

LONGUEUIL, Que.—The Quebec maple crop came in at 225 million pounds this spring, down only slightly from last year's record breaker of 234 million ppunds, the Quebec maple federation announced.

The federation determined a total harvest of 224.9 million pounds of maple syrup from 55.5 million taps, for an average yield of 4.04 pounds per tap.

That puts the globabl crop as the second biggest on record, after it was announced yesterday that the U.S. crop was also its second biggest ever.

Meanwhile, the Quebec federation announced it will allocate another 7 million new taps this year to respond to what it said were the ever-rising demand for maple products. This expansion will increase Quebec's average annual production by about 25 million pounds of maple syrup.

"...demand for maple syrup and our other products continues to grow both at home and abroad, and the Strategic Reserve is still below capacity," said QMSP President Luc Goulet.

The new taps will go to new start-ups and producers wishing to expand their operations, the federation said.

They must go into produciton within the next three production years. [ MORE ]

U.S. maple crop comes in strong at 5.7 million gallons

Peter Gregg | June 16, 2025

RUPERT, Vt.—The 2025 U.S. maple syrup crop was down only slightly from last year, with producers making 5.7 million gallons, compared with 5.8 million last year, according to the USDA statistics service.

Vermont led the way this season with a total of 3.06 million gallons produced, down from 3.1 million gallons last year.

Runner-up states were New York with 829,000 gallons, Wisconsin at 556,000 and Maine with 549,000 gallons, according to USDA.

This would be the first time that Wisconsin placed in the top three in syrup production.

In yields per tap, Wisconsin was number one with 0.463 gallons produced per tap, followed by Vermont at 0.367 gallons per tap average and Maine at 0.312, the USDA reported. [ MORE ]

Electric releasers gain in popularity over mechanicals

Sophia Sutton | May 28, 2025

KINSMAN, Ohio—Electric releasers are quickly taking the place of mechanicals.

Like traditional releasers, electric releasers (E.R.) gather sap from your sugarbush and pump it into your holding tank.

So, compared to the mechanical models, what makes an electric releaser special?

Obviously, if the name does not give you a hint, electricity is a requirement for the use of electric releasers.

The E.R. features a deep well pump that is located at the bottom of the releaser, which is turned on by electric probes.

The job of the probes is to activate the deep well pump to push the sap to the holding tank; this occurs once the sap reaches a certain level in the releaser chamber.

The E.R. can be set to either automatic or manual mode through the control box.

When it comes to the set-up of E.R.s, it is time to whip out that level because if it is not on a level surface you might as well throw all of your hopes and dreams for this releaser out the window. [ MORE ]

Syrup tin cans promoted to U.S. producers

Peter Gregg | May 27, 2025

St. ALBANS, Vt.—Syrup cans, long popular in Quebec, are being promoted in the U.S.

They are appealing to consumers and make syrup very easy to ship for mail order businesses.

Some equipment is needed for sealing the cans. Dominion & Grimm dealers are the place to go for that.

These little cans first appeared in 1951 when the Quebec Ministry of Agriculture set up a drawing contest to promote their use.

The cans, then with a volume of 19 fluid oz, were a more convenient size for household use than the otherwise available tins with sizes varying from 1L to 4L.

Dominion and Grimm said it was excited to introduce them to US sugarmakers for the 2025 season. [ MORE ]