RICE TOWNSHIP, LUZERNE COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) — Maple syrup season is in full swing, and local producers have been waiting on Mother Nature to give them the perfect weather.
Tapping for some sap before the sun comes up is a normal early morning task for Bill Urbanski, Co-owner of Urbanski Farms.
“We generally want to find a tree that’s going to be ten to twelve inches in diameter before we begin to tap it.”
The local sap house in Rice Township is stoked and steaming, producing sweet maple syrup.
Urbanski Farms is in its 50th maple syrup season. Starting with only 13 taps like this one, they now have 530.
“When we first started, we cooked over an open fire, and that’s highly inefficient, so what we have now is a commercial evaporator. This holds about 35 gallons of syrup.”
The labor-intensive hobby has its challenges, but the number one variable is mother nature.
“Like any farming enterprise, we’re very dependent on the weather, and this year had such a cold winter. We didn’t get started until the first week of March.”
This week, the forecast shows warmer temperatures, and as long as it’s below freezing overnight, that’s the perfect recipe to get the taps pouring, the sap boiling, and the syrup drawing.
“Being here in the sap house with the steam flowing and the aromas that you’re experiencing through the air, it’s a great place to be at this time of year.”
If the temperatures don’t stay below freezing at night, Urbanski says the trees will eventually stop producing sap, and the season will come to an end.
