FLANT SUGAR MAPLES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 3590, 26 October 1905, Page 4

FLANT SUGAR MAPLES.

fivery 1 Fanner Can Grow HU Own Supply «* Sn»ar. Should we plant maple groves? There can hardly be two opinions on this subject, The" beet sugar iml ustry is a problem, but the maple sugar industry never was a problem. It pays better than throe-fourths of our farm “work. At eight cents a pound maple sugar finds ready market, while much of the better product sells at ten and twelve cents. The sirup is soul by producers directly to consumers at one dollar a gallon very rarely at- loss than 80 cents. Throughout New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and other states this direct sale to consumers takes up a large part of the product, excepting only two or three counties of northern New York. But It is not just now as a market product that the subject should be mainly considered. Every family is a sugar consumer and a sugar buyer. Most farmers can make the larger part of this sugar supply as easily as they can raise their own potatoes. A family of six or seven will consume from one , to two barrels of sugar in a year. Granulated sugar will cost such a family from ?la to AA a year. A grove of DC,' trees will produce from 200 to 250 pounds of maple sugar. That is, where the trees stand in the open. The product is less where the sugar is made from trees in the forest. This is cquh alent to at least half the family’s r qniremenis for sugar. But the sale, of sirup will make an aggregate value per tree even higher, A grove of 6u trees>,larding in the open will occupy not more than a quarter of an acre. Besides i he sugar product, the grove is ad valuing!'Oils for shade, also for c enormous product of humus each la aUd !'•>.-• windbreaks and shelter, and c an equalizer of temperature and mo!.. tore. Maple trees should grow in’ a grove. They do not thrive well e - street trees, where they arc sub joe l 4 much abuse of the saw and exposm-" the t rank to hot sunshine. A r- ■■■ might well be given place on every farm of 20 acres. Why shall there not ho a general planting of maple. during the spring of 1898? —N. V. Tribune.