For a field trip, we went for an informative maple sugar tour at our local nature center. The snow has finally (mostly) melted. But it was windy and cold. Standing outside in one place and listening for about forty minutes was very taxing for poor Dylan, who had to go sit in the car with his dad after loudly stating repeatedly that he wanted to go home. (Although as a side note, I had possibly mis-led him by telling him we might be going on a bear hunt and might see a bear and he felt a little cheated. We did see a stuffed bear in the nature center hut, but this is not what he had in mind.)
Ryan and I learned about how to bore the hole in the tree, insert the spile, and collect sap in a bucket. The sugar sap that comes out of the tree is completely clear and liquid, like water. Our nature center guide told us several indian stories of how maple sugaring came to be.
Just when we thought our toes were going to fall off from the cold, we were invited back to the fire. This is where they cook the syrup down. There was a large trough hollowed out of a tree which contained tree sap. In the fire were very hot stones. The kids got to practice the indian way of cooking the sap by moving the stones to the trough and dropping them in, where they sizzled and hissed.
Happy last weekend of winter!
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