A minimalist sugaring-off season in the Îles-de-la-Madeleine

Although it was declared intangible heritage of Quebec last year by the Legault government, the tradition of sugaring off has not made its way to the Magdalen Islands, where maple forests are not legion.

• Read also: Serving sugar shacks for over a century!

• Read also: Towards an increase in the price of maple syrup

In fact, the emblematic hardwood, though so abundant on the shores of the St. Lawrence, is completely absent from the native forest of the archipelago. In this regard, the writings of Brother Marie-Victorin, who explored the territory nearly four centuries after Jacques Cartier, confirm a local saying that “it’s not the same on the Islands”.

The famous botanist noted, in his inventory of the Laurentian flora, that the forest had at the time “disappeared from almost everywhere”, except on Brion Island where, today, the forest cover is mainly made up of conifers.

Nevertheless, a few adventurous Madelinots, including Jean-Paul Harvie of Grand-Ruisseau Township, produce against all odds a little golden liquid to satisfy their sweet tooth!

Mr. Harvie, a horticultural enthusiast, planted a dozen maple trees around his house in the 1970s. He says that since they became mature, with trunks about 65 cm in circumference, his trees produce more than 210 liters of maple sap per year. This spring, it will be its 11th harvest.

“It takes 40 ounces (1.18 liters) of water to make 1 ounce (0.03 liters) of syrup,” says Mr. Harvie, who will soon celebrate his 80th birthday. Thus, year after year, he produces about twenty jars of it, which his wife Gabrielle pours into all the reusable containers that come to hand, whether they are Mason jars, peanut butter or Cheez. whiz.

Our island producer also collects his buckets of salted meat to harvest his maple sap. He explains that he has developed a system connecting the torches inserted in his trees to his boilers, in order to deal with the wind factor which is not to be taken lightly in the archipelago. “When it’s windy 90-100 km on the Islands, it’s quite often! That’s why with the pipe, it goes directly into the boiler. And then, with the lid on the boiler, it prevents leaves and junk from flying back into the water.

Other differences with the mainland: the sugar season is later in the heart of the Gulf and the climate is not very favorable there, according to Mr. Harvie. “In the Islands, when it’s cold at night, it’s also cold during the day,” he observes. For example, if it is minus 7°Celsius at night, it is rarely more than zero during the day, whereas it would rather have to go up to 7°Celsius for the sap to flow.

Benoit Boudreau, forest technician at the Municipality of the Islands, is of the opinion that the sector surrounded by mounds where Mr. Harvie is installed forms a favorable microclimate for maple trees, even if the wind is omnipresent there. “You need a sector that is fairly sheltered from the wind, because otherwise we will have misery.”

Moreover, it is on his property sheltered by a wooded area that Hilaire Poirier, in Havre-aux-Maisons, has also succeeded in growing beautiful large maple trees. He says he has sown about a hundred over the years. And he is preparing, for the first time, to experiment with around thirty notches. “My goal was more to make myself adornment than to make maple syrup, you know. But at this time that they are there, I will still try to make myself a cup from time to time to have fun with it!