2026 Maple Syrup Season Ends

It has been a long season, and this weekend we pulled the plug on maple syrup. The weather has been a mix of either continuously warm or continuously cold days and nights, which is not conducive to sap flow or storing collected sap. I ended up boiling three times, and produced a little over 2-1/3 gallons of amber gold. I probably could have gone one more week, but the weather was going to once again be mostly warm days and nights, with only a couple of cold nights to stimulate flow.

Improvements to our process continue. I built a new vacuum filter this year, which was a huge improvement from the last system. We had a dead ash tree come down just before the season started, which provided plenty of firewood that I was able to stage next to my oven; much easier than hauling wood from our usual woodpile. This weekend, I purchased a second 35-gallon tank at a local hardware store sale for half of what I paid for my first tank. Next season, I plan to use the second tank to collect permeate (clean water), rather than relying on multiple 5-gallon buckets.

One of the nice things about keeping a garden journal is being able to look back at past seasons. We skipped 2025, but in 2024 we produced over 2-1/2 gallons of syrup by March 9th. We pulled our taps early because we had produced plenty for our needs. We still have over a gallon of syrup from 2024. Fortunately the high sugar content allows it to be stored practically forever. I made maple syrup caramel corn this winter, so may try that again to use up some syrup.

My first boil of the season was a day in the rain. Last weekend we got over 9 inches of snow, shutting down flow. Yesterday, it was over 70 degrees for our last day of boiling on March 21, and the trees were close to breaking buds. I saw Morning Cloak butterflies while gathering sap. One day into spring. Best to pull the taps, call it a season, and move onto other projects.