LUCAS, Ohio–“There is a kind of excitement which tinges the whole ceremony of sugar making, for it is the symbol of the breaking up of winter and the coming of spring when the sap rises in the trees and the first faint flush of green follows the streaks of melting snow,” wrote Louis Bromfield of sugar time.
The late author, whose historic home and property is now Malabar Farm State Park, likely would be delighted that the park continues the tradition of making maple syrup. Saturday, with the temperature reaching 38 degrees, was ideal for a visit to the park’s 39th annual Maple Syrup Festival.
Those who missed the free event on Saturday can still visit on Sunday, and the festival continues on Saturday, March 14 and Sunday, March 15 from 12-4 p.m. each day. Malabar Farm is located at 4050 Bromfield Rd, Lucas, Ohio.
Buckets hang from spiles at Malabar Farm’s sugar bush. Visitors to the festival see the buckets, and the more modern tubing used to harvest sap from the trees, as they ride wagons to the sugar shack.
A family sits on bales of hay on the horse-drawn wagon that carries them to and from the sugar shack.
A reenactor explains how Native Americans made syrup in hollowed logs using fire heated stones to boil the sap. The syrup was introduced to the settlers who traded European goods for the sweet syrup.
Pioneer reenactors then describe how the early settlers made maple sugar, which was much less expensive than the white cane sugar that had to be imported. The pioneers improved on the Native American techniques by collecting the sap with wooden spiles and buckets and boiling it in kettles over a fire.
Visitors wait outside the sugar shack where today the sap is boiled in an evaporator to render syrup. It takes approximately 40-45 gallons of sap to make one gallon of sryup, Sonn Hupp explained to visitors. She also said, “Pancake syrup, notice I said pancake syrup, is actually corn syrup with added flavoring.” Pure maple syrup will be labeled accordingly. Ohio is sixth in the nation for syrup production; Vermont is first, and Canada is first in the world.
A park volunteer shows visitors the fire retardant fiber on the evaporator. The evaporator reduces the sap to syrup. Sap from a maple tree is 98 percent water and two percent sugar. The park now uses reverse osmosis to increase the sugar content to eight percent before it’s introduced to the evaporator.
Becky and Andy Andreas of Sunbury purchase buckets and spiles to collect their own sap for syrup. The couple moved to Ohio in May and were delighted to discover they had maple trees on their acreage. Andy Andreas’ family lives in northern Minnesota and has been making syrup for over 80 years.
The Ohio Draft Horse Association provides the horses and wagons that transport visitors. At the end of their “shift,” the horses have earned a snack. The horses pull wagons full of visitors up the hill to Malabar Farm’s sugar bush and return them to the parking area.
