Don Mount uses this 1000-gallon tank mounted on a tracked crawler to haul sap from the sugar bush. Photo courtesy of Don Mount.

One of the first sure signs of spring in the Northern Wilds is when the sap starts to run in the sugar maples. Don Mount of Two Harbors has made maple syrup for 30 years. He says it varies somewhat with weather conditions, but the middle of March through the first two weeks of April is when the sap flows in the sugar bush. Usually, the run doesn’t begin until snow has melted away from the base of the trees.

Work begins in late winter, when equipment is readied for tapping. Mount says it is best to get the taps in just before the sap starts to run. Melting deep snow, common on the North Shore, makes tapping trees difficult, because snowshoes are ineffective.

Mount taps about 1,000 trees each spring (he used to tap 3,000). Although most syrup producers now use tubing to run the sap from the tree to a central collection point, he collects the sap in plastic bags attached to the tree, because his maple forest is on flat ground. The sap must be dumped from the bags not long after it has leaked from the tree, otherwise it spoils from bacteria feeding on the sugar.

Traditionally, the sap was boiled to remove the water and make syrup. Mount first removes the water using a reverse osmosis machine and then boils the remaining liquid to make syrup. The boiling is necessary to produce the distinctive maple flavor. His finished product is generally a light-colored syrup, which commands a better price than darker varieties. However, consumer demand for dark syrup is growing, because some folks believe it is more healthful. Mount takes that belief with a grain of salt.

“The darkness is caused by bacteria being boiled with the syrup,” he says. “Late in the season, syrup is dark because the sap contains more tannic acid and lignin. I don’t know how this would make the syrup more healthy.”

What isn’t healthy are Mount’s trees—and other maples in the Northern Wilds. Beginning in the 1980s, the trees began experiencing die-backs, where a few limbs would die each year.  Now, whole trees are dying. Mount says there are no definitive answers as to why die-backs occur, but they may be weather related.

“I have areas where I can’t collect sap any more, because the trees are in bad shape,” he says.

Sap flow varies from day to day and tree to tree. Ideally, the best weather is when daytime temperatures are in the low 40s and the nights drop to the mid 20s. Mount likes a few good days followed by a bout of nasty weather, which allows the trees time to rest before producing sap again. Regardless of the weather, the trees will rest after sap has run for a few days.

He gets about 7 to 10 gallons of sap per tap. On average, it takes 40 gallons of sap to produce a gallon of syrup, though Mount says he gets a 30 to 1 ratio due to a higher sugar content in the sap. The quality and abundance of sap is controlled by several variables: the previous growing season, the size of the tree’s crown, and spring weather. Drought also affects production.

New holes are drilled for tapping each year and Mount likes to change trees each year, too. Less than two inches deep and about a quarter-inch in diameter, the tap holes close up within about one year after use. While there is some risk of introducing disease or pests to the tree via the wound, the tap doesn’t seem to cause long term harm to the tree.