(_From the Government Bulletin._)
Development of Present Conditions.
Maple sugar was made by the early settlers as an article of food, the
West Indian cane sugar being costly and difficult to transport inland.
The commonest kind of “muscovado,” however, was preferred to maple
sugar, if it could be obtained. With the increased supply of cane sugar
there is little doubt that maple sugar would have almost ceased to be
a commodity on the market but for its peculiar flavor, which, while
objectionable for general purposes, created a special demand. Thus,
while the cheaper and unflavored cane product has almost displaced
maple sugar as an article of food, the demand for maple syrup and sugar
as luxuries and flavoring materials not only keeps the industry alive,
but calls for a continually increasing supply.
It would naturally be supposed that this growth in demand would
have been followed by a corresponding increase in production. Such,
however, is not the case; while the demand for maple sugar and syrup is
continually increasing, the production has been more or less stationary
for twenty years. The explanation lies in the fact that, at the very
lowest estimate, seven-eighths of the product sold today is a spurious
article, which is only in part maple sugar, or is manufactured entirely
from foreign materials.
When maple sugar began to come into general demand, the market fell
naturally into the hands of the wholesale dealers. The farmers
were unorganized, and, as a rule, out of touch with the consumers.
Consequently the sugar, made in the early spring, when the farmer was
most in need of ready money, was generally either sold to the country
store at a low price, or exchanged for cane sugar, pound for pound,
irrespective of general market conditions. It was then bought again by
the “mixers” and used to flavor a body of glucose or cane sugar six or
ten times as great, making a product which was marketed as “pure maple
sugar.” The mixers preferred to buy a dark, inferior sugar, because
it would go further in the mixture. If the season was bad they bought
less, but at almost the same price, and increased the proportion of
the adulterant. Thus a shortage in the maple sugar crop has no effect
whatever on the general supply. It is also true that while the trade in
maple sugar has been steadily growing, the production from the trees
has remained stationary. The mixer controls the situation, with the
effect of lowering the profits of the farmer, preventing a compensatory
increase in price when the crop is short, and retarding progress in the
industry by the demand for a low-grade tub sugar.
[Illustration: MAPLE SUGAR CAMP IN ONE OF THE
LARGEST GROVES IN NORTHERN VERMONT.
(Continuation of this picture on opposite page.)]
But there has always been a certain amount of trade in pure maple
sugar and syrup. A part of the city and town population comes from
the country, where they have known the genuine article, and they have
generally been able to supply their wants by dealing directly with the
producers. The progressive and well-to-do sugar maker has also worked
in this field. Of course there are farmers and others who, having pride
and capacity, do their utmost to produce the best goods and market
them in the most advantageous manner. Such sugar makers are unwilling
to sell their high-grade goods to the mixers at a low price, but make
every effort to reach a steady market of regular customers.
In the effort to make such a market more general, several maple sugar
makers’ associations have come into existence. That of Vermont is
the most notable. The annual meetings of this society have done much
to stimulate improved methods, as well as to build up a legitimate
trade. The association has established a central market, has adopted
a registered trade-mark, and guarantees absolute purity. Its trade,
through advertising and other business methods, has reached good
proportions. But there is only a very small part of the business, even
at the present time, which is not in the hands of the mixers.
[Illustration: MAPLE SUGAR CAMP IN ONE OF THE
LARGEST GROVES IN NORTHERN VERMONT.]
The following quotations are from the testimony of Mr. Madden before
the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Fifty-seventh
Congress, pages 85 and following:
Mr. Madden. I would like to speak to you a moment in regard to maple
syrup. That is a subject that will undoubtedly interest you all. We
are in a very peculiar position in regard to maple syrup. We do not
believe it is right that a syrup composed of maple syrup made from
either the sap of the maple tree or from maple sugar and mixed with
glucose should be sold as a maple syrup; but we do believe that a maple
syrup made from syrup of the maple sugar and mixed with cane-sugar
syrup or refined-sugar syrup, I will say—because beet and cane sugar
are the same after they have been through boneblack—we do believe
that should be sold for maple syrup, and I will tell you why. In the
first place, the amount of sap of maple syrup—that is, syrup that is
made from boiling the sap of the maple tree without converting it into
sugar—is so limited that it would not, in my judgment, supply more than
5 percent of the demand for maple syrup in the United States.
Now, when maple sap is boiled into sugar—and I want to say before I go
further that the reason that the amount of sap syrup is so limited is
because it is hard to keep it from fermentation, and the season is so
short in which the sap runs that it is difficult to manufacture, to
boil enough in the camps to supply the demand; consequently a large
proportion of the sap in the States where maple sugar is made is boiled
into maple sugar. Now, we have found by experience—not by chemical
analysis, but by experience—that the maple sugar made from the sap of
the maple tree in Ohio is not so strong as the maple sugar made from
the sap of the maple tree in Vermont, and that the maple sugar made
from the sap of the maple tree in Vermont is not so strong in flavor as
that which is made in Canada, in Quebec Province, because it seems the
colder the climate, the stronger in flavor the maple sap is.
Now, we buy these various sugars and reduce them to a liquor to make
maple syrup, and I will give you my word, gentlemen, if we take a
Canadian sugar, which is the highest priced maple sugar we have, it
being worth at the present time twelve cents a pound, while Vermont is
worth only eight cents a pound—I give you my word that if we make a
liquor by melting that Canadian maple sugar, without the addition of
sugar to reduce the strength of the flavor, it is so strong you could
not use it.
Mr. Coombs. What do you mean by strong?
Mr. Madden. Strong in flavor.
Mr. Coombs. You mean it is positive?
Mr. Madden. The flavor is so positive; yes, sir.
Mr. Coombs. And it is sweet?
Mr. Madden. Sweet, yes; but if you put it on a hot cake you would say
right away, “Take it away; I won’t have such stuff,” and you would
ordinarily say that it was glucose. You would be wrong, but that is
what you would say.
Now the Vermont sugar is not so strong, and it does not require so much
cane sugar to reduce that to a flavor comparing with the natural maple
syrup obtained from the sap itself; and I tell you that we can take
maple sugar and reduce it, blending it with cane sugar—and by that I
mean take ordinary cut-loaf sugar, for instance, and melt it—and we
can take this syrup that is made by melting the maple sugar and blend
it with the white syrup, and we can produce a maple syrup that is in
flavor strong enough and yet delicate enough to satisfy the appetite,
and that, in my judgment, is better than the sap syrup made from the
maple tree for a great majority of the people.
As an illustration, although we get $11.50 per dozen gallons for a
sap maple syrup that is boiled from the sap of the maple tree and the
character of the maple syrup that I have just described, about 95
percent of our business is on the syrup that is made from the maple
sugar and the cane sugar rather than on the syrup made from the sap
itself. Now, if we have to take this maple syrup and brand it as cane
sugar, or have any such restrictions, we can not sell it. Now, what are
we going to do? We do not believe in frauds any more than you do. We
think just as much of our reputation as you do of yours; but we do not
want to be held responsible for conditions that we have not built up.
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF MODERN EQUIPPED MAPLE SUGAR CAMP.]
Mr. Coombs. It seems to me your whole argument has illustrated that
everybody who buys these things knows he is not buying the pure article.
Mr. Richardson. It is either that or you are deceiving them, one or the
other.
Mr. Madden. Well, I will answer another phase of that question.
Now, it is commonly assumed, I think, that these blends, mixtures,
substitutes, and what some of our theoretical gentlemen call commercial
frauds, are done for the purpose of palming off on the people something
that is cheap or inferior at a high price. Right there is where the
mistake is made. The profits on that class of goods are less to us
than on the higher class and more expensive goods, because competition
forces these lower-class commodities down to such an extent that they
pay us less profit than any other.
We could not take a maple sugar and mix it with cane sugar and obtain
the price for pure maple-sugar syrup unless it had the quality, unless
it cost so much. In other words, in speaking of maple syrup—and here
is the part of this I forgot to speak of—if you take maple sugar and
reduce it to the liquor, as we call it, and had to sell it without the
addition of any reducing sugar or white syrup—not glucose, but pure
cane or beet sugar—if you have to sell it without doing that, it would
be so expensive as to be prohibitory, because with Canadian maple sugar
worth twelve cents a pound today, it taking eight pounds of it to make
a gallon of syrup, you would have a price of nearly a dollar a gallon
for your liquor as a first cost, without the cost of package. * * *
The above quotations will illustrate sufficiently well the processes of
manufacturers and dealers in adulterating maple syrup. It is evident
from this testimony that if the pure article be obtained when purchased
at random it is by accident rather than by intention. Whatever may be
the condition of the products when they leave the manufacturers in
Vermont, New York, Ohio, or Canada, it is evident that all that part
which goes into general commerce is subject to extensive adulterations.
Only that part which enters domestic commerce, that is sold directly by
the manufacturer to the consumer, can be considered above suspicion.
It is evident from the above résumé of the subject that the
adulteration of maple syrup is practiced to an enormous extent.
As stated by one of the witnesses, it is doubtful if more than 5
percent of the amount sold in this country is the genuine article.
It is evident that the makers of the genuine article are forced into
competition with these extensive adulterations, thus lowering the
legitimate price. Every grove of maple trees in the United States would
be worth a great deal more to its owner if the state and national laws
should be so framed as to eradicate this great evil. Such laws would
permit the sale of these mixed goods under their proper names, and thus
protect both the manufacturer and consumer.
Necessity for Sugar Makers’ Organizations.
With a steadily growing demand for maple syrup, which today is almost
entirely supplied by the mixer, the producers of pure syrup can hope
to control the trade only through organization. The difference between
the pure and the adulterated product is so marked that there would
be little question as to choice, with the genuine sugar known to the
popular trade. A large number of the consumers hardly know pure maple
syrup when they taste it, and as so great a part of that on the market
is spurious, they have little chance to learn. Under such a condition
the market can be gained for the pure product only by means of united
action. An example of such action is the present Vermont Sugar Growers’
Association.
The situation is very similar to that which has already been
successfully met, in the case of certain other farm products, by
organized cooperation of producers. Sometimes, as in Germany and
Canada, this has been initiated and substantially aided by government
action; sometimes, as in Ireland and England, it has been carried
through entirely by private enterprise. Some years ago Canadian dairy
products formed but an insignificant proportion of the exports of these
articles to Great Britain. Now, through the efforts of the Canadian
government to foster intelligent and honest methods of production, an
English market has been secured for the Canadian output. The Irish
Agricultural Organization Society has gone far toward bringing about an
economic regeneration of the island, and in Germany rural prosperity
has been vastly increased by the same methods. In all these cases the
principal purposes aimed at have been the improvement of methods of
production, and furnishing a guaranty of purity to consumers.
In the case of maple sugar producers the first necessity is a market
for high grade, unadulterated sugar and syrup. This they should be able
to secure without much difficulty through responsible association,
which can guarantee the quality of all the product bearing its name or
stamp. * * *
The Amount of Sugar in Maple Sap.
Maple sap is a nearly colorless liquid composed of water, sugar and
various mineral substances, such as lime, potash, magnesia, and iron;
it also contains some organic matter in the form of vegetable acids.
The peculiar flavor of maple sugar comes, not from the sugar, but from
some one or a combination of all the other substances contained in the
sap.
The amount of sugar in the sap of the average sugar maple tree varies
greatly, the percentage changing in each tree as the season progresses.
Careful experiments have shown that the sap contains on an average
about 3 percent of sugar. The maximum is reported at 10.2 percent,
which was found in a small flow of sap from a sugar maple near the end
of a season, during which the tree averaged 5.01 percent.
The Manufacture of Sugar and Syrup.
_The Sap Season._
The sap season throughout the maple sugar belt of the United States
generally begins about the middle of March and continues until the
third week in April but it varies very widely with a late or an early
spring. Sugar making has begun as early as February 22 and as late as
the first week in April. The season lasts on an average about four
weeks. The longest run on record included forty-three days, and the
shortest eight days.
[Illustration: LARGE MAPLE SUGAR CAMP IN CENTRAL VERMONT.]