ForestHarvest: non-timber forest products in Scotland

 RESEARCH

Case study: Maple syrup

Maple syrup is tapped from the trunk of the sugar maple (Acer saccharum) in the northern USA and Canada. Other species of maple can also be used for this purpose, including red maple (Acer rubrum) and black maple (Acer nigrum). The sap begins to run in February and March, when the temperatures start to rise.

The tree grows naturally in the woods of North America, ranging from south-eastern Manitoba to Nova Scotia and south to Georgia and Louisiana. It is slow-growing and can live for at least 400 years. Most maple sugar is now produced from managed (modified) natural forest or from plantations. Management regimes can have a significant effect on productivity.

The sap is traditionally tapped by cutting a V-shaped gash in the bark with a hatchet, and collecting the runoff in a bucket or a birch-bark container. Nowadays sugar-makers use special drill-bits and taps, causing less harm to the tree. The sugary sap is processed by boiling.

• In 1998 world production of maple syrup was 25 million litres, of which slightly over 20 million came from Canada. The Canadian crop was valued at around $115 million.
• This is one of the few temperate non-timber forest products that can compete with, and even exceed, timber value in a given forest area.

In contemplating the present opening prospects in human affairs, I am led to expect that a material part of the general happiness which heaven seems to have prepared for mankind will be derived from the manufacture and general use of maple sugar.

Thomas Jefferson, 1791

Changing land use practices and the economics of the industry have led to a decline in the extent of the maple sugar orchards ('sugarbushes'). There are also some concerns about die-off of sugar maple in eastern North America, possibly related to air pollution and introduced pests.