Each spring, the first inkling of anticipation is met with a familiar conversation, a conversation which is usually preceded by ears being directed skyward. One can almost detect the sugaring crowd walking around ears canted to the sky, their heads tilted and moving form side to side much like a dog trying to conjure the meaning of life. They are listening not to the sound of dripping sap but for the return of the Sandhill Cranes.
“Heard any Cranes yet?” that is the question. The phone will ring and instantly there will be the excited declaration “I heard ’em. They’re back.” It is time for the maple trees to emit their tears of joy.
It is not unusual for the maple tappers to have there set ups in place before the arrival of the Sandhills but for some reason the likelihood of actual flow is not great until the Cranes are back.
This year out of the bitter cold, came a number of warm days that caught the sugaring crowd with a pleasant surprise, so, in a fit, most headed to the woods to hang the buckets and run the lines only to find the ground so frozen nothing flowed and all the anxious winter-fed desires put on hold. Where were the Cranes? They, it seemed, had not arrived and were still lingering to the south not trusting the sudden switch.
The waiting game began as the weather did a few dips and doodles. In our case the arrival of our grandchild also approached and the dipping and doodling added to the apprehension for this would be his first chance to gather the nectar of the midwest forest and, most importantly, to fire up the boil to render the golden treasure. Jake, the eight year-old kid, is a fire bug, so this was going to be a blazing opportunity and also the first year in what one would hope to be the first of many to come.
A few days before his arrival, we heard drifting snippets among the locals that Sandhll Cranes were around, but we had yet to hear one even though the geese were on the move giving us hints. Still, the Sandhills must have been here because the sap was now running and by the time the tow-headed child arrived we had a good start on the project with twenty-five gallons. Once the kid was given the sugaring lecture, we tripped around the neighborhood gathering the day’s flow, all the while listening to tales of rock-hounding and fishing.
Once face into a half-filled bucket, what got his attention was the sweetness of the sap itself. He initially put his finger under a tap and tasted the dripping nectar but then decided that was too slow and just opened his mouth right under the tap, and slurped it up like a little bird in a nest. For some reason this years sap was heavily graced with sugar---even the Red Maples that tend to run stingy, ran high. Back at the sugar shack (house), he proceeded to fetch a cup and simply dip it in the bucket and pour it down his gullet.
While he was constantly distracted by another inferno he had going, in the fire pit, the blaze under the boiling pan was well fed by all the scraps of wood he scrounged up under the local vegetation. The steam billowed off the pan, the fire leapt from the brick burning pit and as the day wore on, the smell of maple syrup drifted around the buildings and across the lawn. Occasionally off in the distance, a Sandhill Crane would let out a spring-time bellow. The kid ran around tending both fires, bringing in accumulating sap and throwing objects for the dog--all as the spring blossomed.
Thus ended his first sugaring here in Wisconsin. Today it will be forty seven, the grass is greening, the sap still flows but the yard is quiet as the eight year old has returned to his home in Colorado. It would be a great thrill to think he could come close to Jim’s thirty-nine years of springtime joy.
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