I tapped that

It's maple syruping time in Boston.

Global climate change critics please take note...it is February. Over the past 4-7 years the syruping dates have progressively inched earlier and earlier. Until this year the earliest date to begin tapping trees was February 19th, two years ago. This year tapping began on the 15th. The season has been earlier and shorter.

But it was a BEAUTIFUL day. I think I have a sunburn. Although to be honest, it could just be spending hours in the sugar shack. We were stacking wood all morning, making it easier for Lynda, the farm manager, to stroke the fire and add wood every 20 minutes. Maple syrup begins as sap, which is 97% water. It takes a lot of boiling (until it reaches a steady 219 degrees) before it's boiled down to syrup. In fact, it takes 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of syrup.

And this afternoon I probably gathered enough sap to make a couple of gallons of syrup.

I came home exhausted and covered, no really, covered, in sap. I don't think my muscles are willing to move anymore. I'm obviously going to have to sleep on the couch tonight.

Big operations use hoses to collect sap, but they're not working on over 100 different sites like our farm does. Today we went to the Sherborne Cemetary and collected buckets from about 100 trees. Then we were off to the Peace Abbey, a Buddhist organization that happens to have a bunch of maple trees. After another hour of carrying buckets there we moved onto private residences.

Apparently it's all the rage in Sherborne. There's a street called, you guessed it, Maple Street, along which most of the yards exhibit maple trees with buckets. We only made it to two houses before the giant water container was full. It measured 325 something, I'm guessing gallons?

Sap, I should mention, looks just like water. It almost tastes like water too, although it's definitely got a sweet, yet somewhat mettalic aftertaste, almost like those flavored waters from Sam's club. They always ALMOST tasted like something.

I'm going back tomorrow, although I should be cutting salad greens in the greenhouse. I'm hoping that takes all day because I know they're looking for more physical labor. And tomorrow they're off to the local park, prison, and more front yards. Another 325 gallons of sap in the morning, and again in the afternoon.

That's a lot of syrup.