A Sweet Season at the Maple Project

How do we know when it is time to stop collecting sap?  

That’s a frequent question as the spring comes on and the temperatures warm up. It’s hard to tell exactly when it happens, but there are lots of signs. For example, the temperature consistently stays above freezing overnight. The buds on the trees start to pop open and tiny little leaves begin to appear. The spring peeper frogs begin to sing on the pond. The sap itself changes; it is no longer clear and slightly sweet but now cloudy and more bitter as the chemistry of the sap shifts based on the needs of the tree.

We’ve had a great season. Our record collection—with buckets brimming to overflowing—was 115 litres of sap in a single day. Over the whole season, we gathered over 860 litres of sap from the 13 trees and 20 taps. Grade 6 families came out during March Break to help and learn. Lower School students shared their knowledge of maple production with their parents during Student Led Conferences. DP1 ESS students braved the snow squalls and fierce winds of mid-March to gather sap before March Break. 

The trees have taught us patience and knowledge and how to work with them and the weather.  We discovered it is hard work sometimes! We developed connections with the natural world in new ways. We have worked in close partnership to create something out of the gift that was offered to us from the trees’ abundance.

The 'sugar moon' is one of the thirteen moons in the Indigenous calendar referring to the full moon that occurs in March-April, signifying the end of winter and the beginning of spring. It is  the time of gathering maple sap and making syrup. In her book, Braiding Sweetgrass, Potawatomi Elder and plant biologist Dr. Robin Wall-Kimmerer writes about this partnership in the chapter called “Maple Sugar Moon, "Nanabozho's teachings remind us that one half of the truth is that the earth endows us with great gifts...The other half belongs to us...it is our work, and our gratitude, that distills the sweetness.”

The Dining Hall is further distilling that sweetness with a feast to conclude our Maple Syrup Festival next week and preparing maple-based dishes using our SJK syrup. We’re grateful to the trees and one another for all of our work together that connects us so strongly to the land around us.