Maple Sugar Season in Pennsylvania

That's me, next to a sugar maple. Today's latest technology involves plastic jugs and plastic conduit lines for tapping the syrup

Spring is late this year and I'm extremely restless to get out and paint. But it's still a little cool for my fingers to paint outside and the landscape is not quite in bloom yet. Nonetheless, maple sugaring season is well under way and my husband and I took advantage of a bright, sunny afternoon to attend this year's Maple Harvest Festival at Shaver's Creek Environmental Center in central Pennsylvania. I’ve included a few photos from our afternoon to share with you:

The evaporators in the sugar shack

The different stages of refinement as the water within the sap is boiled off to create syrup

Displaced glass marbles illustrate the volume of water that is boiled off and the change in density of the sap as it moves from a watery substance to a more viscous substance