Fort Drum celebrates Maple Days

FORT DRUM, N.Y. (March 23, 2026) -- Community members got a taste of a North Country tradition when the Fort Drum Directorate of Public Works’ Natural Resources Branch hosted its annual Maple Days event, March 16-21, at the LeRay Mansion sugarbush.

Visitors began their tour at the tree line, where staff explained how sap rises from the roots to the branches. They demonstrated how metal taps are driven into live sugar maples to collect the sap, and that the process relies on the right weather. At this time of year, cold nights below freezing and warmer days create pressure inside the tree, which pushes sap into the collection buckets.

Travis Ganter, Fort Drum forester, said they installed 186 taps on the sugar maple trees this year and collected, so far, roughly 1,000 gallons of sap. It takes approximately 45 gallons of sap to produce one gallon of syrup, and Ganter showed attendees how it’s done using an evaporator.

“A lot of people come up here from the south for the first time, and they have no idea that this is how it’s made,” he said. “Showing them how real maple syrup comes from a tree and not out of a bottle is what really what brings me joy.”

Ganter demonstrated using a hydrometer to determine when the boiling syrup reaches 67-percent sugar content, which is the standard for maple syrup. After being filtered, the final product could be sampled.

“Probably my favorite part of Maple Days is seeing the kids come up and look in the evaporator and watching the sap boil,” said Mike Stiefel, Fort Drum forester. “And then having them get a taste of fresh maple syrup after they see how it’s made.”

Ganter said this hands-on approach is the most effective way to explain the syrup making process.

“When I studied forestry in the Adirondacks, the woods were our classroom,” Ganter said. “It was hands-on learning. We weren’t just sitting in a classroom listening to someone read from a book. So, obviously, I prefer this where people can actually see the taps on the trees, they can smell the sap that is boiling and then taste the warm syrup. If we incorporate all of that with what we are trying to teach them, then they are more willing to entertain it, and retain it.”

The Saturday tour included a demonstration of the traditional method of boiling sap in a cast-iron kettle over an open fire. Or as Jason Wagner, Fort Drum Natural Resources Branch chief, described it, the “low tech” method.

“Anybody that has a pot at home can collect sap and boil it down to syrup,” he said. “All you need is time and a fuel source to make heat. When you get the sap out of the tree, it’s about three-percent sugar. When you pour it on your pancakes, it’s about 65 percent. All you did was take away a whole lot of water – that’s your recipe.”

Wagner said Maple Days is as much about education and stewardship as it is about syrup.

“For over 18 years, we’ve had the privilege to be able to show off this unique operation that doesn’t happen anyplace else in the Army,” he said. “This basically takes the roots of forest management and good stewardship and portray that to Soldiers and their families. We have people from all over the world stationed at Fort Drum who get to experience this for the first time. It’s pretty amazing to be able to show them this connection to natural resources and why the forest where they train matters.”

To learn more about Maple Days in New York state, visit http://www.mapleweekend.com.