A little maple humor - do people think before they speak?

[Goggleeye]

Last summer at a local farmer's market, I was asked by a fairly intelligent looking, middle aged man "So, exactly how do you get the bees to just pollinate the maple trees?" I almost laughed out loud thinking he was being sarcastic, until the look on his face told me he was as serious as a heart-attack. I swallowed my laugh and politely explained the process.

Now I do realize not many folks in SE MO make syrup, and we were set up right next to the local honey guy, but . . . Wow. How disconnected we have become as a society from our agrarian roots.

[DonMcJr]

As a Beekeeper too...That was funny!

[Goggleeye]

Guess I should have explained to him the tedious process of training bees to recognize maple leaves!

[Springfield Acer]

It's a lot like how deer know to cross where the deer crossing signs are. Why do the highway people put them in such stoopit places? :confused:

[Flat Lander Sugaring]

I thought those were signs to look for dancing deer :lol:

[Pweideman]

I am asked all the time if we need a rooster to get eggs.

[Ausable]

Questions from the "Back to Organic" folks are best. Is this Maple Syrup Organic? -----Why yes my Dear - I use nothing but Elderberry Spiles and gather my Sap in Birch Bark Buckets. My Maple Trees are fertilized by Free Range Chickens. I Boil my Maple Sap in Colonial Cast Iron Pots in an Open Hearth. It is bottled in pure hand blown glass bottles and sealed with genuine cork stoppers and shipped immediately to your market in an Ox drawn cart. -----A look of wonderment passes over their face as they are true believers and this is just what they wanted to hear. I was later given the Liar of the Year award. lol ---Have a Great Season ---Mike---

[Tweegs]

How funny.

Had to explain the bit about bees and maple trees to my dental hygienist just the other day.

I have a flock of 40 hens and 4 roosters, we sell a bunch of eggs here at work.
I get the rooster and egg question all the time.

I’ve taken to just having fun with all the questions.

Bees don’t pollinate maple trees, rabbits do. No, really, they climb right up there and…
In order to get brown eggs you have to feed the chickens chocolate milk.
Chocolate milk comes from brown steers.
No, I don’t know how to milk a brown steer, I think they use goats.

I try to see just how far I can pull someone’s leg. You’d be amazed at how gullible some folks are. More than one walking around here with a limp.

[ericjeeper]

had a lady ask me just the other day, if I had any "Sugar free maple syrup". I kid you not.

[Pweideman]

Lol. We had sugar free maple syrup but it evaporated.

[Mudcat_21]

That one made me LOL Eric!

[Spolcik]

had a lady ask me just the other day, if I had any "Sugar free maple syrup". I kid you not.

Yeah It's called water! LMAO

[Maplebrook]

I was explaining to a visitor how the sap started and stopped each day depending on the freeze-up the previous night. I was saying how it started to run around lunch time as the sun warmed the trees. This was around daylight savings change weekend. I commented that when the time changes it will mess up our collecting schedule as the trees don't start to run until an hour later each day. The person thought that the trees knew it was time change weekend and adjusted their flow accordingly.

Here's another: I have collected "beaver chews" - short pieces of hardwood the beavers skin and cut to short lengths - from the brook near here. I use them in the camp for angle braces on the corners of the walls. A visitor once asked:"how do you get the beaver to cut them that length?" I replied that I cut the branch, stuck a post-it note on it with my desired measurement, and dropped it off at the lodge and picked it up a few days later. Thinking she would see right through this, she didn't and asked: "What about this one that is half cut off?" (one of the braces is cut partially through by the beaver) to which I replied "that spot is where I stuck the note. The beaver didn't read carefully and thought it said "cut here.""

[Pweideman]

Fabulous storys.

I make organic body care products. Soaps, lotions etc. A woman was shopping my booth for a friend. She asked about the ingredients I use to make my soaps. When I mentioned I add shea butter as a moisturizer she said, "oh, my friend can't have dairy."

[backyard sugaring]

Last summer I was leaving a soccer field with my son. This woman reach up on a pine tree put her finger on the pine pitch put it in her son's mouth and said this is where maple syrup comes from. My son and I have never laughed so hard. The poor kid will never eat "maple syrup" again. Good luck this year. Lee

[sugarmangraham]

I had a similar thing happen to me. A customer asked "what kind of pine tree does maple syrup come from." I looked at him kinda of funny and he then said "duh, it must be some kind of maple pine" Then I just politley said no it comes from a sugar maple tree. I have to learn to mess with people a little more for my own amusment.

[Goggleeye]

had a lady ask me just the other day, if I had any "Sugar free maple syrup". I kid you not.

At the same market, different day, we had a lady take our offer to sample our syrup. As soon as it hit her tongue, the most panic-stricken, terrified look came across her as she said "That's got sugar in it! I'm diabetic!"

[sg5054]

Guess I should have explained to him the tedious process of training bees to recognize maple leaves!

If you can do that, then you should be able to herd cats....

[jgrenier]

Had a guy stop by while i was boiling the other night and while i was boiling he asked " don't you have to put suger in this stuff"

[Galena]

Bahahaahahahahaaaaa...thanks for the laughs all, so glad I wasn't drinking anything while reading this thread or it'd be all over the screen...

Oh yeah. My oldest brother came to visit and although he grew up here in Ottawa, he seems to have forgotten a lot. He very kindly offered to help collect the 'maple syrup from the trees'. :lol: But his comment came back to haunt me as I had fun with the idea for an Absurdity challenge on a competitive-photography site I belong to: http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=1053701

Ironically during his stay, that was the 4-day freezeup here, so we didn't collect ANY sap during his visit. Sweet revenge, I call it!

[bowhunter]

My wife's sister lives in Florida, but is originally from Ohio. She's asked my wife twice if I have to put sugar in maple syrup. I guess some people don't get it.

[SevenCreeksSap]

We gave our friends, a couple, some syrup last year. they decided to make french toast, and she said she wasn't fond of his french toast because he put vanilla in the egg mix for flavor. he denied it was too strong and he only uses a drop or so. They called and said the syrup was good, but we had put too much vanilla in it.

I had to break the news theres no vanilla in my syrup.

[maple flats]

We gave our friends, a couple, some syrup last year. they decided to make french toast, and she said she wasn't fond of his french toast because he put vanilla in the egg mix for flavor. he denied it was too strong and he only uses a drop or so. They called and said the syrup was good, but we had put too much vanilla in it.

I had to break the news theres no vanilla in my syrup.
On a more serious note, vanilla is one of the subtle flavors in the maple syrup, as described by taste experts.

[Hal]

Back in the seventies, a friend of mine who was working on the farm went back to Long Island at Christmas time to visit his family. Someone asked him what he had been doing. He told them he had been cutting sugarwood. they asked him how we got the syrup from the sugarwood, and were treated to a long involved explanation featuring a giant hydraulic press etc. etc.

[Galena]

We gave our friends, a couple, some syrup last year. they decided to make french toast, and she said she wasn't fond of his french toast because he put vanilla in the egg mix for flavor. he denied it was too strong and he only uses a drop or so. They called and said the syrup was good, but we had put too much vanilla in it.

I had to break the news theres no vanilla in my syrup.

I sometimes get a very subtle light lemony note, usually towards the end of a run when the dark stuff starts to flow. Maybe a little bit of buddiness, but it's never overwhelming.

Last year I remember seeing someone on here posting that they had a batch come out vinegary. Wondering if they've perected a dill or bbq flavour yet :D

[CBOYER]

it is not humor, but to complete the Vanilla taste:
http://www4.agr.gc.ca/AAFC-AAC/display-afficher.do?id=1231367338440

[Pweideman]

it is not humor, but to complete the Vanilla taste:
http://www4.agr.gc.ca/AAFC-AAC/display-afficher.do?id=1231367338440

It's not funny at all but it's pretty cool. Thanks.

[noreast maple]

Had a group of people come in the local store the other night and asked the clerk if she knew of a producer in the area that would let them fix their breakfast plates at home that next morning and bring them to the producers place to hold under a spout for their pancakes. all she could do to not burst out laughing.

[hdb90]

Hi I'm new to your site and could help but add a story. A few years ago my Father-In Law had a large pump hooked up to his tractor. He pumped water from his pond to the top of the hill where he had a slide. The water ran down the slide with all the kids and adults sliding back into the pond. A lady sat there looking over the situation and asked Andy. "How do you keep from pumping the pond dry". Andy smiled and answered "I was wondering how we kept the water from running over the dam". With a dumfounded look she stared back shaking her head.

[Dill]

Thought this would fall under the maple humor flag
7483

[CBOYER]

Thought this would fall under the maple humor flag
7483

See the same photo, said: White Smoke...New Pope !:lol:

[maple flats]

I drive school bus. Yesterday I followed another bus that was leaving a big cloud of white smoke. I told the driver he should check his coolant, or was he just celebrating a new pope?
today, the bus went for a new head gasket.

[Galena]

AHA! This is the thread I wanted to resurrect! Go nuts people!

[DonMcJr]

I got one from the newspaper photographer this past Saturday...

After showing him my 3 holding tanks of Maple Sap which I clearly explained to him I proceeded to fill my preheater pan with sap.
He then says, "Why again do you add water to it?"

Haha...but I have to say almost immediately he said" oh duh...that was a stupid question its sap not water!"

[WestfordSugarworks]

I work for a guy who lives a town over from me. I tapped for him and still help out now that the season's started. At a dinner one night he met one of his wife's relatives for the first time. The relative asked the guy I work for, 'what do you do for a living'. My guy said,' I have a 10,000 tap sugaring operation'. The relative responded, 'what's your real job'?

10,000 taps and a dairy farmer too. Now wouldn't that make you angry?

[n8hutch]

My, mother in-law walks up to the sugar house & See's my sap tank in the back of the truck half full 150 gallons or so. Valve hooked to A hose to a pump and says " Do you Need Help Lifting that Tank out of your truck? Your not going to lift that alone are you?" I just laughed and kept doing what I was doing.

[Goggleeye]

OK guys, I have another one for you. At a market, some lady is looking at pictures of our January sugarbush with lines running tree to tree and asks "So, you just boil the leaves to make the syrup?" My 10 year old daughter looks at my wife with a "You've got to be kidding" look on her face. Wish I'd have been there. I would have said "Yeah, but the real pain is keeping out the oak leaves because the tannins will really taint the flavor."

[Bucket Head]

Sold syrup at a craft show last weekend. I spent quite a bit of time explaining the whole process to this one guy- from 2% sugar in the sap right out of the tree to bottling up 67% syrup and everything in between. He then points to the bottles on the table and says, "So is there any sugar in these?".

Here's your sign...