Ohio state maple

Buckeye Teaching Evaporator: The First Boil!

by at

Exciting developments at the Ohio State University-Mansfield campus!  We installed a teaching maple evaporator under our new pavilion near the research sugarbush and just completed our first boil last night.  This step is fairly monumental for Ohio State Maple, and there isn’t anything quite like the feeling of seeing that first draw-off.  Somehow we’ve got a grainy image of that moment last night to commemorate the experience!

First things first – a formal thank you to Roger and Suzie Gortner for continuing to do our production sap processing.  They have made exceptional maple syrup from our OSU trees for the past 5 years and will continue to be instrumental in that regard.  We literally could not do it without them, and we’re grateful that it’s an arrangement that works for both parties involved.

But now for the first time ever, we have our own evaporator.  No, it is not sized to keep up with a production woods of almost 1,200 taps, but it is perfectly sized for demonstration boils on a teaching scale.  With help from local producer Galen Smith from Mount Vernon, OH, our team set up an 18” x 66” drop flue evaporator early in winter of 2023-24.  After a test boil to dummy out a few variables (or maybe to dummy out the dummies…us!?), we put fire under sap concentrate on Wednesday, February 14th – Valentine’s Day.

Four 5/16″ lines kept sap flowing from our larger sap tank into a holding chamber that our reverse osmosis unit was drawing off.  We adjusted the PSI on our RO to almost perfectly sync and match the raw sap movement with our RO processing speed.  After some adjustments to align the 2 processes, we were taking sap from 2.1 to 4.6 Brix concentrate.  6 hours later, we were halfway there…

Eventually, we crept up to 7 degrees F over the point of boiling water.  You know what happens next.

A teaching evaporator with small-scale RO unit allows us to now teach via-demonstration tree-to-bottle workshops and seminars on an Ohio State campus, provide more complete tours for events like the upcoming Maple Madness event on Saturday, March 2nd (more on that in a second), and sets the table for a new Sustainability Theme GE course debuting in Spring of 2025 – Maple: A Sweet Taste of the Past, Present, & Future.

So yes, come visit us on Saturday, March 2nd at the OSU-Mansfield Maple Pavilion.  We are excited to host folks for pancakes and syrup between 10 AM-1 PM, tours of the sugarbush and nearby vernal pool wetlands all day long until 5 PM, and good fellowship with one another for the Ohio Maple Madness Tour.  Once you are on campus, just follow the signs!

2023 Syrup is Going, Going, Almost Gone…

by at

We are so thankful for our loyal base of Ohio State maple syrup fans.  In fact, our repeat customers do such a good job of cleaning out each new inventory release, that there is very little leftover to share with potential new customers.  This year, 80% of our released stock sold within 2 weeks including every single one of our special 5-year commemorative glass etched bottles.

We do have some OSU maple syrup left.  If you are interested, please visit the OSU Maple Store through the Woodland Stewards website and purchase quarts for pick-up (either on Columbus or Mansfield campus) or doorstep delivery.  Time is of the essence as we are down to just 75 or so jugs remaining.  The proceeds from syrup continue to support excellent hands-on, field-based student internships in the sugarbush and in the broader Ecolab at Ohio State Mansfield.  Thanks!

Ohio State Maple Syrup BACK IN STOCK

by at

The Ohio State Maple Store is back in stock.  Our 2022 syrup inventory has officially hit the shelves, and you can place your order here.

Glass half pints and jug pints, quarts, and half gallons are available.  Orders can be shipped to your door (extra fee) or picked up at the Franklin County Extension Office off Kenny Road in Columbus or from Riedl Hall on Ohio State Mansfield campus in Richland County.

We are so appreciative of the support everyone has shown in purchasing syrup.  Thanks to your purchases, we have employed 5 different students working field-based experiential jobs just this calendar year alone.  One full-time student and 2 part-timers during our 2022 maple research season, and 2 additional full-time positions that just recently completed summer fellowships.

 

New OSU Maple Syrup SHOP

by at

We are excited to have a new maple shop up and running on the Woodland Stewards website.  The new shop gives us a few new features to track orders and supplies a bit better.  The 2021 syrup run is all bottled and waiting on your orders as the Holiday season approaches.  We have 1/2 pint glass bottles available in addition to pint, quart, half gallon, and gallon (gallons by request only) available in jugs.

I am happy to report that syrup sales placed 2 part-time students and a full-time recent graduate in the field throughout last winter’s sugaring season.  From both a production standpoint (how the maple syrup is produced and hands-on learning of that process) and research standpoint (how to ask good research questions and how to set up experiments to get answers), each student had an incredible enriching experience thanks to your support of the program.