The Past
I started sugaring because my parents were sugaring. I guess it wasn't a choice. It was something I liked to do so I kept doing it. I am the third generation of people sugaring in my family. Both my grandfathers and their fathers all sugared before, so we've done it for awhile. On this property we've been sugaring about 20 years. When we first moved here we sugared here for two years in the existing sugarhouse, then we built the new one and we've been here ever since.
We've always used pipelines to sugar here. We had an older sugar house just past the one we have now. It's always been pipeline, some vacuum, some not vacuum. Now it's all on vacuum. We have changed how we sugar a lot. We used to do it with minimal investment, now it's a big investment.
I learned how to sugar from my father, the gentleman who owned this farm and Don Connors. I've picked up a lot of knowledge from a lot of different people and asked a lot of questions along the way. You gotta' want to work a lot, but it's a good life. ~ Matt Playful