Welcome to The Club Spring 2024

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Sap Buckets - First Sign of Spring
As the warmth of the spring sun begins
to create fringes of lacy crystal ice at the
edges of snow piles, I know one thing for
sure - - the sap will soon be running.
I’ll watch for the buckets that will be
hung on the aple trees along familiar
roads, and I will be tempted to stop and
have a taste of the sweet liquid I know will
be dripping into them.
Years ago another familiar row of maple
trees bordered the hill on the road to our
farmhouse. My sisters and I would follow
our father and watch as he went to ‘tap’
the trees. He slowly turned a hand drill
into the sunny side of the trunks, white
curls of inner wood fell to the ground and
a small metal ‘spile’ was inserted. We’d
get our first taste as the sap started to flow
out over its lip and into the bucket hung
underneath.
After school it would be our job to
collect the sap in pails and carry it to the
boiling-down site over in the sugar bush.
Donning rubber boots, each day we’d find
our way along the paths where sugary
snow was starting to turn to mud.
If it was ‘boiling-down day,’ we’d be
greeted by the smell of wood smoke.
With any luck, Dad would have already
collected the sap from some of the trees
and we could hear the rhythmic ‘drip,
drip, drip’ of the liquid as it hit the bottom
of the metal buckets. He would have
been there all day, tending the crackling
fire that burned under the huge black
iron kettles hanging from chains over
the flames - it takes 40 gallons of sap to
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make one gallon of syrup, and hours v2.1 of Canatara Log Cabin Restoration
patience. He’d watch as the sap bubbled
ME." "SO YOU'RE 96?" THE
v2.2 Sarnia-Lambton Rebound
in the big cauldrons, every once in a while
v2.3 Lambton UNDERTAKER Shores Nature COMMENTED. Trails
skimming the froth off of the top as the
colour changed from clear to dark amber. v2.4 nuSarnia SHE RESPONDED, Foundation
"HARDLY
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It was a time he enjoyed, relaxing v3.1 with Lambton WORTH Wildlife GOING Inc.
HOME, IS IT?” info@wyomingtreeservice.ca
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gearing up for a summer that meant v3.3 long Miracle Max’s Minions
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gravel business and doing farm chores.
After making sure all of the buckets
v3.5 Bluewater Centre for Raptor Rehabilitation
had been emptied, we’d sit and V4.1 watch VPP
with him. He’d mention the call of a
blue-jay or tell us that he’d seen a deer
earlier, ask us about what we had learned
in school that day. Quiet conversation,
comfortable - I guess, the modern day’s
version of ‘quality time’ spent with our
father. Sometimes I recall spreading my
notebooks out on my lap and doing my
homework while he sat on the log next to
me.
As the sun dipped lower, the leafless
trees of the sugar bush stood out like dark
sculptures against a crimson horizon.
Mom would come down through the
woods with supper -sandwiches and
thermoses of soup and tea or maybe a
cold beer for Dad.
Once the boiling-down process has
begun, it can’t be stopped and the last few
hours can become tedious as the thicker
the syrup becomes, the easier it is to burn.
Sometimes it would be long after dark
before my parents would bring the syrup
home. The next day Mom would bring it
to a boil in batches on the stovetop, so
she could skim any impurities off, before
running it through cheesecloth into sealer
jars.
Our reward for all of this effort was
the delicious maple syrup that covered
mounds of my mother’s home made
pancakes.
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SPRING 2024 (Family Feud Answers) A famous bridge.– Bridge Over Troubled Water P A G E 7