Sugaring

Our main occupation on Two Pigs Farm is sugaring. We have over 1,000 taps, storage tanks, pumps, an RO machine (reverse osmosis), and a large "arch" or evaporator. We hope to make about 400 gallons in the 2009 season once we are fully up to speed and add another 1,000 taps next fall.

The process is simple enough. Sap has about 2% sugar. It is boiled until the concentration is just right for syrup. That's about it. You can get fancy and use lines instead of buckets, pump the sap down the mountain instead of simply relying on gravity, you can use a reverse osmosis machine to increase the sugar content to 6% or better by eliminating a lot of the water content. This also shortens the boiling time or you can use a fancy filter press and canner if you like. But, at the end of the day, you are boiling the sweet sap and it is done in March, at the end of winter, when neighbors first come out of their houses to get neighborly again. It is the first sign of spring and the sap rises all around.