Statistics are rather unreliable, but it is probably not far from the fact to say that half the total crop is made into syrup and half into sugar, the proportion of syrup to sugar rapidly increasing. Syrup properly put up and stored keeps well, but sugar keeps better. The former sells at retail at ninety cents to $1.50 a gallon, the latter at seven to twenty cents a pound, according to quality and quantity, time of year, size of crop, and other fac tors. Early or first run sugar, light in color, fine in flavor, in small cakes, sells at fancy prices early in the season ; but the main crop, good, bad and indif ferent, is likely to bring a low price, which at times has been below the cost of production. The tobacco men and the sophisticators sometimes pay high prices for the strong-tasting goods of more or less uncleanly antecedents ; but except for these special purposes, speaking broadly, the light-hued goods of mild and delicate aroma are preferred to the darker ones of more decided flavor, and com mand better prices.
Centralization in maple-sugar-making.
The latest step in the evolution of the maple sugar industry is the inevitable one toward which all forms of human endeavor seem destined,—that of centralization. The making of the thin syrup at the individual plants still continues, but buyers contract for the entire supply to be shipped to some central point for grading, reworking, concentration and sale. These central plants are sometimes co partnerships of private individuals, sometimes sup ply houses for individual wholesale grocery firms, and sometimes associations of sugar-makers, such as the Vermont Sugar Makers' Market at Randolph. The manifest advantages of such centralization are a greater uniformity of product and better control of sales. They doubtless afford a desirable sales market for many small makers ; but the well informed, well-equipped owner of a considerable sugar-bush can generally do better to complete and to sell his own products.
Literature.
W. S. Clark, Circulation of Sap in Plants, Report Massachusetts Board of Agriculture, 21 (1873); Same, Observations on Phenomena of Plant-life, Report Massachusetts Board of Agriculture, 22 (1874) ; C. S. Sargent, The Sylva of North America, Vol. II, (1890) ; W. W. Cooke and J. L. Hills, Maple-Sugar, Vermont Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 26 (1890) ; C. H. Jones, A. W. Edson and W. J. Morse, The Maple-Sap Flow, Vermont Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 103 (1904), from which the logs in Fig. 650 are adapted ; J. L. Hills, The
Maple-Sap Flow, Vermont Experiment Station, Bul letin No. 105 (1904) (Popular Edition of 103) ; Wil liam F. Fox and William F. Hubbard, The Maple Sugar Industry, United States Department of Agri culture, Bureau of Forestry, Bulletin No. 59 (1905); A. J. Cook, Maple Sugar and the Sugar Bush; Wiley, The Sugar Industry of the United States, Part IV, Bulletin No. 5, United States Department of Agriculture (1885).
Maple-syrup-making from Ohio Experience.
There is no better way of setting forth the principles involved and the methods employed in the making of maple-syrup and maple-sugar than by describing the practice in one of the foremost maple -sugar - producing sections in the country. The discussion that follows is based on sixty years of observation and personal exper'ence, chiefly in northern Ohio.
The old ways and the new.
The old way, still remembered, was to " box " the tree with an axe, cutting a deep "cart" or a sort of pocket, boring up into it with a three fourths-inch anger, putting in a long elder spout, catching the sap in a wooden sap-trough hewn out of a soft-wood half-log some sixteen inches in diameter, and boiling it in a huge iron kettle on a pole resting on two crotched posts. The boxing soon killed the trees, but trees were plentiful. Then came the improvement of hanging three large kettles, each on a long, strong pole hung like a gate or a well-sweep, so as to raise or lower the kettles or swing them from over the fire. The three kettles were swung into a row, two large logs were drawn up, one on each side for a sort of " arch," and smaller wood was jammed and cris ,amssed around the kettles. Smoke, coals, ashes and dirt fell in, the sap scorched on the kettles, and the syrup was dark.
The next improvement in boiling is shown in Fig, 651. Five large iron kettles were set in a crude stone arch with chimney and open mouth, and wood about ten feet long was thrust under the kettles. Such an arch fifteen feet long, and holding five large kettles, would boil into thin, dark syrup one to two barrels of sap per hour, according to the skill and diligence of the firing. The corru gated evaporator, 4 x 16 feet, shown in Fig. 652, with good wood and good firing will evaporate five barrels per hour into the finest eleven-pound syrup ready for the market, with half the fuel. Forty to fifty gallons of sap make one eleven-pound gall°. of syrup in Ohio.
Details of the sugar-making processes.