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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Sweet Sap Sugar Maples

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  • From: Richard Harrison <rharrison922@yahoo.com>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Sweet Sap Sugar Maples
  • Date: Sat, 8 May 2010 18:54:49 -0700 (PDT)

Sarah,
    Sugarcane won't grow for you there. Sweet sorghum will only grow where there is at least about 80 days of growing season----for the shortest season varieties.
    As for sugar maples, a fairly large North Florida wholesale nursery used to sell them here in the 1980's or later. Don't know if amy survived when planted here, but they shipped everywhere. They are out of business now.
    I wonder about sweet gum trees? They grow everywhere here. They like wet soils. They resemble silver maple. "Old timers" used to score the tree and get "chewing gum" from the sap. The "original chewing gum". It should be sweet---maybe sweeter than maple, I would think because it congeals on the bark.
                                                    Regards,
                                                    Richard

--- On Sat, 5/8/10, Sarah Kehler Ewing <skkewing@yahoo.com> wrote:

From: Sarah Kehler Ewing <skkewing@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Sweet Sap Sugar Maples
To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Saturday, May 8, 2010, 4:47 PM

I realize now that I should have done more research on sugaring maples prior to buying these ones!

I wish I'd paid $22.00 a tree as T&T has absurd prices on these trees ($42.50 each which is a high, but not an unheard of price for fruit trees: at least they are very nice trees!).  Unfortunately, T&T are the only source I have ever seen in Canada selling the Sweet Sap Maple trees. When I ordered them, I didn't know they were a Silver Maple as they were called Sweet Sap sugar maples throughout the entire write-up.  Sometimes T&T is a little vague with tree details: last year I bought Capilano apricots from them and then found out during a phone call that they were seedlings and not grafts which I felt was implied in their catalogue! I argued with them that I felt their write-up was misleading and that the seedling vs graft thing was a very important point that ought to have been included, but the buyer I spoke with disagreed with me!  I'm going to be more than a little annoyed if I find out that these are seedlings too, they sure aren't grafts but then
vegetative reproduction is not unheard of in maples.

However, I googled the Sweet Sap variety and came across a discussion on a Sugar Maple web site that expounded on the difference between Silver (Acer saccharinum) and Sugar maples (Acer saccharum).  Basically they said that one should plant sugar maples unless your soil is too wet and then plant silver maples.  And also that this variety is fairly new on the scene and has the highest (that may be unconfirmed according to the research, love that!) sugar content of trees tested.  But that isn't a huge issue for me: poplar has about an 80:1 ratio and the popular Manitoba Maples (Box Elders for you Americans) is up there somewhere too so I'll be happy if they thrive and give me something better than that!

My 16 trees are just a start: hopefully I can graft the Sweet Sap onto other sugar maple rootstock or just plant more real sugar maples.  Gotta start somewhere while still managing a family budget! 

Maybe I should try sugar cane... I did buy seeds from Ricters a few years ago for sugar beets which is a pretty big crop up here!

Sarah
zone 3
Edmonton, AB


Sweet Sap Silver Maple — Acer saccharinum,  C. Larson selection
3 to 4 ft. trees $22.00 each, 100 or more $15 each
A special selection of Acer saccharinum that produces sap with a sugar content of 3 to 5%. (Sugar maples run about 2 to 2.5%) The advantage to the syrup maker is less time collecting, hauling and boiling down sap. Silver Maples will grow on wetter soils than sugar maples and they are much faster growers, becoming tappable in about 8 to 10 years. They are also tolerant of clay soils. Discovered in Canada by Cedric Larson, and propagated via tissue culture.





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