Tapping a Maple Tree at Home, Part 1

Thought about taking a class to learn how to tap a maple tree for quite a while, but always missed the special classes offered around the Farmington area, but this year was going to be different. After spending the last couple of years learning about the health benefits of maple syrup and cooking with it week after week making our Handcrafted Maple Nuts, it made perfect sense to learn about maple tree tapping, with the end result being creating our very own maple syrup, which did in fact happen in March.

We dashed to the class taking place at Heritage Park in Farmington Hills last Sunday morning and got there in the nick of time. Carol, the volunteer instructor, was very enthusiastic about maple tree syrup and explained how extremely easy it is to tap a tree.

Carol is right! After listening to the lectures and viewing an actual tree being tapped, we went home and decided to try it that very afternoon. The timing of the temperatures and the tree budding is critical - it has to be just right and we knew that the time was either coming or already past, so there was no time to waste in getting our jug up on the tree. There are two giant silver maple trees in the front yard that hadn't budded fully yet. This empty vinegar jug is what we initially used, but we had to scramble to find other suitable, empty jugs and jars to use.

Success! Between the two trees, they produced around 8 gallons of sap. We finally decided to end the tapping as we ran out of jugs or jars to fill and store. Just look at how much sap we got within 7 days!