Maple Syrup Making

Rent your own Maple Sugar Bush

Greg’s Guide Services will provide everything you need including the trees, personal instruction and even a sugar shack in the woods to help you make your own 100% natural Maple Syrup.

For 10 years we’ve been making maple syrup using traditional taps, buckets and a wood fired evaporator. In the syrup business ours is what’s known as a backyard operation. We’ve discovered that early spring is a great time to be in the woods and found that we use only a small portion of the trees available to us. Now we’ve decided to share our good fortune and our maple trees.

In March, we’ll take you into the woods, just 10 minutes from Hayward Wisconsin, and show you how to select and tap your trees and hang the buckets. As soon as the days warm to the 40’s and the nights stay below freezing the sap begins to run. Nothing is certain, and everything depends on the weather, but the peak of sap season is usually during the first half of April. During these great spring days you’ll be free to visit your sugar bush whenever you have the time. (If you can only visit on the weekends, I can tend your buckets for you.) Once you have enough sap stored up it’s time to start boiling. I’ll have the wood chopped and split for you but it still takes time to reduce 40 gallons of sap down to one gallon of syrup. Get a good boil going and the evaporator will reduce about 8 gallons of sap per hour to a product close to syrup. The trick is in keeping the boil going. After the sap is reduced close to the finished product, we’ll move it to a propane cooker for finishing, then bottle it in whatever bottle you choose, from mason jars to fancy bottles suitable for gifting.

The rustic cabin is available for you to use for a card game and glass of wine with your friends or for the kids to work on a jigsaw puzzle while you take turns feeding wood into the cooker. Make it as much or as little work as you wish. You and Mother Nature will determine how much yield you’ll get.

If you’re looking for a unique experience, something your friends haven’t done, then this is it. You’ll end up with bottles of syrup nice enough for a WOW! reaction when you give them as a house gift or Christmas present, and you’ll have a great story to tell as well.

2007 Prices (for the 2008 syrup season)

$300 (plus bottles) for enough trees, equipment, firewood and personal instruction to make 1-3 gallons of finished syrup. Contact me at 715-462-4104 or click the Contact Us tab to discuss details, schedules and accommodations. We only have enough equipment for 2 groups so contact us now to reserve your trees for next spring.