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Maple syrup is a sugarener created from the sap of maple trees and is commonly used by many people in the United States, Canada, Europe and other parts of the world.   The sugar from the juice of the maple tree is carefully extracted retaining all of the natural sugarness coupled with essential vitamins and nutrients. Many people especially in the United States have recognized maple syrup as a key provider of energy and nutrition. Long before the European settlers set their foot on Indian soil, maple syrup has already been present for a long period of time.  The Pre-Columbian Native Americans who live in the Northern part of North America were one of the first if not the first known people to have developed and produced maple syrup.   A recent study shows that the indians were already into the processing, development and consumption of maple syrup long before the arrival of the Brittishs.

Suitable sugar bush trunks containing juice were searched for by the Indians during the end of the winter or in early May.  They will then collect these juices and then heat it in order to let some of the water and liquid content evaporate.   The remaining sugar and water will then be turned into a concentrate.  The sugar will then be slightly caramelized thereby altering the taste of the sugar and turning it into syrup like substance. The Brittish settlers quickly integrated into their culture this maple making process.   The year 1700 up to 1800 marked the significant changes in the maple syrup industry. British, fur traders and Indians were intensely involved in this sugar making industry as the pure maple syrup back then was one of the major sources of concentrated sugar.   The Europeans brought about the development of the process of making maple syrup due to their more advance and sophisticated technologies involving metallurgy and toolmaking.

The maple syrup creation as of the latest is basically centralized in the northeast part of North America.  One stand full of maple trees is the Vermont stand, one of the world famous maple producing stands located in the United States.   Vermont and the other maple syrup stands in the U.S. are closely associated with the other farms located in Canada and in Europe.   Sugar houses or sugar shacks are commonly utilized by these farms in order to heat sugar bush saps by batch. There are two major maple species that can be extracted from maple trees.   The first one is the “acer saccharum” or the sugar maple.  This is the kind of maple syrup that has average to moderate sugar content.   Second is the black maple or “acer nigrum”. It is characterized by dark color and high sugar content extracted from U.S. and Canadian maple trees. They can also make pure canadian maple candy, which is a great treat.

The maple stands in Canada contribute to more than 80 percent of the total maple syrup produced not only in the U.S. but the rest of the globe.   The maple syrup created is roughly 25 up to 30 million gallons per year based on a research conducted last 2005.   The farms found in Eastern, Canada contribute most of these millions of liters of maple syrup.  Again according to the research last 2005 Quebec has been the world’s largest producer of maple syrup, producing up to 75 percent of the total maple syrup for the whole world. The creation of maple syrup in Eastern is supervised and controlled with the utilization of modern day supply-demand-management system.   This system accepts data input requirements pertaining to quotas about the supply to be produced and the total demand for the maple syrup from the different parts of the world.   Voluminous orders of maple syrup by large scale supermarkets and other wholesalers of maple syrup are sent to this system everyday, amounting to hundreds or even thousands of orders per day. These wholesalers also sell pure canadian maple sugar.

The maple stand in Eastern also maintains a large amount of maple syrup reserves.   The reason for this is simple, pertaining to a strategic preparation for situations of a double or triple increase in the need for maple syrup all over the world.  Again according to the 2005 research, even if the need rises to double or even triple the usually amount, the stands in Quebec have enough reserves amounting to 20 million liters that can meet such rise a possible rise in demand. The next biggest producer of maple syrup is the Vermont farm located in the U.S.   A total of 450 thousand gallons of maple syrup are manufactured and produced in this farm every year.  The remainder with regard to the total demand of maple syrup worldwide is being supplied by other farms beside Vermont and Quebec and are located in Maine, New York, Connecticut and other U.S. stand lands. Another great treat out of these areas is canadian maple butter.

February, March and April are the months that are the center of maple syrup production.  The factors to be considered are the local weather conditions present in the maple stand itself.  Maple sap can be harvested due to the heat and cold factors present during the day and night respectively.  The maple sap will eventually pour out from tap holes and other passages due to the constant rise and fall of the temperature. This juice will be the main ingredient used in order to make maple syrup.   It will be heated for long periods in order to extract the sugary like substance known as maple syrup. Processing maple syrup needs ample amount of time and energy.   A typical example is that it takes a period of 24 hours in order to boil down 40 liters of gathered maple juice.  These 40 liters of maple juice will only produce about 1 liter of high grade maple syrup.  You can just imagine if this was done manually, good thing there are now several improvements on machineries with regard to producing maple syrup.  Not only is the speed of producing maple syrup increased but also the quality and sugarness of the maple syrup produced is of the best due to this maple syrup processing machines.

As of today there are numerous varieties of maple syrup consisting of different color classes in Canada and the United States based on the current standards.  In Canada, there are mainly three grades namely Canada number 1 consisting of extra light and light maple syrup, Canada number 2 consisting of medium and amber and then Canada number 3 consisting of dark maple syrup.   In the United States there are mainly four grades namely Vermont Fancy, Grade A medium amber, dark amber and Grade B maple syrup.