Tree Growth

[nmcbride]

Hey everyone, I'm brand new to this. Just planting a few saplings on our property this year (just looking to produce someday for personal use). What sort of time frame am I looking at from planting a two foot sapling to being able to tap? (Growing in SW Ontario, Canada).

[Run Forest Run!]

Welcome nmcbride! You didn't say, but I assume you planted sugar maples? I planted all of the soft maples that I tap. They were also two foot saplings at the time. They were 25 years old when I started making syrup from them, but that's only because I didn't realize until then that I could, in fact, tap soft maples. In reality I could have been tapping them at least 10 years earlier. My soft maples are planted in the landscape and not in a forest, and continually offer more sugar content than the sugars that I tap - but those are mostly forest trees.

If you've got the room, and want to tap earlier than the sugars, you might consider planting a few soft maples too. The taste of syrup from softs is more delicate and some of my friends prefer it. I keep separate batches and also make soft/sugar blends. It's like a maple winery around here. :lol:

As for how long it will take to get your sugar maple tapable, I have one sugar maple that I planted from a seedling that originally fit in my coffee cup. I haven't tapped that one yet, but likely could have five years ago. That tree is the 35 years old and was transplanted from my family home to my new home so it had a little bit of a growing setback 25 years ago.

[nmcbride]

Thanks! That's good to hear. I'll likely plant a combination then, I'll also be working these trees into our "landscaping" so hopefully with little competition and some TLC they'll grow quickly.

[Run Forest Run!]

Another thought, I planted more trees that I'd ultimately need in the landscape. After about 10 years I culled around half of them. The best and strongest were kept and the weaker ones (or misshapen ones) were removed.

[cncaboose]

Soil fertility has a HUGE impact on how fast they grow as does the genetics of the individual tree. Some sites and trees will take 10+ years to add an inch of diameter while other combinations will do an inch in 2 years. Having said that, a little hand fertilization every spring with manure or 10-10-10 will make a big difference on how long it takes to get them to tapping.

[nmcbride]

Thanks guys, soil fertility should be good. It's an old bush lot that was cleared relatively recently (last 15 years'ish), but I've noticed a huge bonus in fertilizing when I planted cedars a while back so that makes sense.