Sugar Maple
"Official tree of New York State"
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Sugar Maple |
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Sugar maple (Acer saccharum) is the most abundant of the seven maple species found in New York State, and is common throughout New England, the Lake States, mid-Atlantic States, and several Canadian provinces. It is historically and economically important in the production of maple syrup and as a timber species.
There
are over 800 maple syrup producers in New York State. These sugar bush managers
produced and sold over 139,000 gallons of maple syrup in 2001. Annual revenues
from the New York State maple industry are valued at over $5 million. In addition
to its economic value to landowners and the State, maple syrup production has
important cultural and recreational significance to the families who tap trees,
boil sap and bottle syrup in the early Spring of each year. The New York State
Maple Producers Association provides an organizational and educational framework
through which producers meet and share information through a newsletter.
Maple producers and rural landowners throughout the maple syrup producing regions of the Northeast seek to acquire improved sugar maple seedlings for future sap production on abandoned agricultural lands, for replacement of roadside sugar maples that have declined and to improve sugar maple regeneration within existing sugar bushes.
The
Uihlein Sugar Maple
Field Station of Cornell's Department of Natural Resources, located in Lake
Placid, NY, has managed a Sugar
Maple Tree Improvement Program for some 30 years. The program began with
phenotypic selection for sap sweetness of over 21,000 trees in the Northeast.
Progeny tests of the most promising selections demonstrated significant differences
in sap sugar concentration. Clonal orchards and a seed orchard containing higher
performing selections produce seedlings for field trials to test treatments
such as the use of fertilizer, tree shelters and weed control. The orchards
are used also to fulfill the demand by existing and prospective maple producers
for improved trees.
In recent years the Maple Improvement Program began conducting on-farm research with maple producers to determine survival and growth of the selected trees under the variety of environmental conditions found on farms and sugar bushes throughout the Northeast. Participants in the Agroforestry Learning Community who plant improved maple seedlings are part of this collaborative research activity.
For further information about the collaborative outplanting
trials of improved maple seedlings see:
Krasny, M.E., L. J. Staats, P.J. Smallidge, and C.E. Winship, 2001. The sugar
maple story: collaborative research with extension agents and growers. Journal
of Forestry 99(8): 26-32.
To contact the New York State Maple Producers Association contact: Tom Todd at (315) 353 2892 or mksinc@northnet.org