Price to rent a sugar bush

[jcb]

What do you folks pay for renting trees or what would you think is a fair price? I'm looking at about 400 taps and hoping the guy will just take some syrup in trade for the use of his trees. If not I want to be prepaired to give him a dollar amount.

Thanks

Jim

[treefinder]

i pay .30 a tap. i think this is the going price?

[Brian]

If you do all the work and supply all the line and install. I would give about a 1.00 a tap and a couple gallons of syrup. I also would want a 3-5 year Agreement.
At the end of the 3-5 years the owner would own the lines in the woods. After that you could buy the sap or continue year to year lease.
when you leave take the tank and vac with you or you may sell it to the owner. Good Luck

[Jim Brown]

jcb; We have a 7 year lease with a 7 year option on 150 acres. we pay .50 per tap on vac and .25 on natural flow.

Jim

[dano2840]

a friend of mine taps state land and is paying .50 a tap i think

[treefinder]

1.00 a tap is way to much! like i said before i pay .30 a tap and i signed a 5 year lease.all my tubing is mine and it goes when i go!you would have to sell 10 gallons of syrup just to pay for the bush rental,then at the end of 3-5 years give all tubing and taps to the bush owner ? theres know way i would even consider that. i would rather go help out another sugar maker ,get some free syrup for the help and not have a penny invested but your time.
just my point of veiw. i have been making syrup for 11 years and love it but i would give it up tomarrow if i had to pay out that much a year to make it. or go alot smaller and find some road side trees to tap for a little syrup each year.

[markcasper]

.30 cents a tap was the rate when commercial syrup was $1.00 lb or less and light amber 1.50/1.60. The last few years there has been little to no difference in price between the grades. Now with syrup in the 3-4 dollar range, I would feel guilty of only paying the landowner .30 a tap. Just my 2 cents. Also keep in mind-property taxes have also risen from the days of $1.00 lb syrup.

[TapME]

Just remember that everyone's cost have gone up including ours. I pay with syrup 1 gallon to a 100 taps, works well for me.

[jrthe3]

on the trees that i rent this year being the first year to rent a pay .25 a tap i offered .40 and the land owner said that was to much cause they would just sit there and not make him any money anyways so he said .25 was good to him i put the tubing in and it is mine it goes with me if i ever do

now i found another bush for 2010 season the owner will buy all the tubing i put it up and i can tap it for 5 years then he wants to tap it witch i don't think he will ever tap cause he has been saying he was going to start sugaring again for the last ten year

[halfast tapper]

There is know way I would pay 1.00 a tap and then give him the tubing.
Granted that the price of syrup has gone from 1.20 lb to 4.00 lb , but the price of equipment has gone up too. Tubing has gone from 19.00 a roll to 55 to 60 a roll. Used to be able to buy 1 inch black plastic for .15 cents a foot , now it is around .40 cents.
Syrup has gone up and that is good, but it only went up the amount that the equipment has gone up over the years.
We pay around here .35 to .45 per tap if lines are left up year round.
The only way I would pay a dollar is if the sap came out of the tree at 12%.

[jcb]

Thanks for all the great input

Jim

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

You have to do what works for you and the landowner, whether it is .30 per tap or $ 1.00. I have 3 bushes and I don't pay anything for any of them. One bush has 115 taps and I give them 9 quarts of syrup as it is tied up among a bunch of heirs and they are distant family members and I want them to have a good taste in the mouth(no pun intended).

Another bush has 160 taps on it and they get 6 quarts of syrup. My other bush is split between 2 properties. One property has 165 taps of woodland trees and not great producers and they get 6 quarts of syrup and the other part of the bush has 65 taps on it and they get 6 quarts of syrup because they have the road and property access to get to the 165 taps that adjoin it. Everyone is happy and I am happy and that's the main thing. 9 quarts x $ 12 = $ 108 for 115 taps. Maybe high you think, but I don't own a single tree and all the years I have made syrup, no one has ever ask for anything or any money and I tree to keep them happy.

So in reality, I guess I pay 65 cents per tap. 27 quarts x $ 12 / 500.

[Beweller]

As I said somewhere on the forum, $0.30 per tap sounds like highway robbery to me. That's like $21 per acre for a good bush. And your tapping is decreasing the value of his timber stand. What is the land worth? Surely not less than $1000 per acre, maybe three times that. The owner should expect something like a 6 percent return , or 60-$180 per acre. If he can't get that, he should be considering cutting the timber.

[Dave Y]

Consider this. Timbering is typically a once in a lifetime event on any given tract for the landowner. Most land owners get one pay day from there timber. and it cover the taxes and maintence over the last 30yrs.However if you paid the landowner a fair price to tap his trees over the same period of time. He quite well may make a similar amount of money. Last year I paid my landonwer 500.00 for 1000 taps this year I will pay 850. for 1700 taps.by the time this bush is tapped out,i will be paying around 2000.00 . Now the only trees I am impacting are maple trees. There is still the other speicies to consider when it comes to timber value. When you are setting up a bush it is for an extended period of time. I belivie that you can tap the trees and pay the landowner a fair price and he will still have his trees. Some of you think .30 tap is too much. I think it is not enough. Give the man a real price, any where from .50 -1.00. It is an investment in your business. The price of doing business. in this senerio every one makes some money. my thoughts.

[PATheron]

I have to totally agree with Dave on that one, Ive had the same thoughts. I pay .50 but on high vac its a no brainer. I want the property owner to be totally happy with the deal. I also help him with his firewood whatever. I would anyway being hes a neighbor but if a guy lets me tap trees and especially if they run into the sugar house its worth a lot to me. My opinion is there is no syrup without the trees. If your gravity though its bit different becouse if you have a bad year? Guess have to figure what its worth to you and what you reasonably figure you can make. Theron

[fred]

If you do all the work and supply all the line and install. I would give about a 1.00 a tap and a couple gallons of syrup. I also would want a 3-5 year Agreement.
At the end of the 3-5 years the owner would own the lines in the woods. After that you could buy the sap or continue year to year lease.
when you leave take the tank and vac with you or you may sell it to the owner. Good Luck

i just dont understand the logic in doing the work and paying for it. then giving everything away just to buy it back again

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I agree with Fred on this one, but every area is different and if that is what the landowner requires and what it takes to be able to make syrup, then so be it. You do what you have to do if you want to make syrup but I wouldn't offer anything to the landowner like that up front unless it was at least a 7 to 10 year agreement and only if the landowner demanded it.

[Dave Y]

I dont mind paying a fair price to tap. But I would not give my investment away. ie tubing and mainline

[Jim Brown]

I agree with Dave Y. On our lease any thing we put in the woods except maybe a new sugar house at some point in time belongs to us. and We have to give a 1 year notice to the landlord if we are moving out and in turn he has to give us one year notice if he wants to break the lease.That gives us time to get our lines down


Jim

[brookledge]

I pay to some and give syrup to some depending on what they want.
Anyways the going rate around me is .50 per tap. I feel that is a fair price and since I get between .33 and .5 gal of syrup per tap I'm happy.
Anyways another issue is if you have multiple owners like I do the land owner at the bottom has to be happy cause with out him I lose the whole bush.
Keith

[802maple]

Personally I look at it this way. If you can get it for ,30 cents a tap that is great, but if you look at as if you were to buy the land and try to make syrup off it you can't possibly own it for .30 cents a tap. It wouldn't pay one months taxes in Vermont, so a dollar a tap isn't bad either. Alot of the traders on here sugar on their own land and they are paying themselves alot more than a $1.00 a tap whether they know it or not.

[Chad802]

I rent a sugarbush for .50 per tap. but I would pay a1.00 per tap because
its worth it for me.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I was thinking they were worth $ 1 per tap too especially when you are running vaccum like Keith and making .33 to .5 gallons or more per tap. .5 gallons per tap at $ 4 per lb wholesale prices is $ 22.60 value of syrup per tap, So you are paying 4.4% of you return in syrup back to landowner for sap and at a higher retail price, a lower percentage. I guess the fair thing would be to base the tap rental on the wholesale price of syrup and it should work out fair for everyone. Seems like with the price of bulk doubled what it was a couple of years ago, the landowner is who is losing out bigtime in most cases as he is still get same rate per tap when bulk was 50% of what it was this year.

[treefinder]

i have been seeing alot of post on what people should be paying and what they are paying , and who's not being fair to the land owner.so i think it all boils down to is if the land owner is happy then were happy. we pay by the tap not by vaccum or tubing or buckets a tap is a tap .we don't pay by volume . well unless the land owner sells his sap to you but then he would have all his time and money invested.

[markcasper]

Brandon, You hit the nail on the head!

Heres a different twist compared to say grain farming. Down in Iowa, land rents are right around $200 an acre for 200 bushel corn ground. I have heard of rents as high as $400 an acre, thats a different topic.

Anyway, at 200 bushel and acre and corn selling at $4 a bushel, the landowner would get 1/4 of the gross profit, since $800 would be the gross per acre.

Using Brnadons 22.64 per tap. I will be conservative at say 60 taps an acre. Using that formula, the gross profit would be $1358.40 per acre of tapped maple. If the landowner recieved 1/4 of that, it would equal $339.60 per acre, or $5.66 per tap. Now this is figuring 1/2 gallon syrup per tap and $4 a pound syrup. If you wanted to go with 1 quart per tap and pay the landowner 1/2 of that, it would be $2.83 per tap. Lets cut the bulk price to $2 a pound, cutting the landowner again, it would equal $1.42 per tap rental.

This is why I think .30, .50, and a $1 is way too low!

[cncaboose]

Mark, You need to remember that the real estate value of good tillable corn ground per acre is a lot higher than the value of even decent woods per acre. If you have woods with timber value, the real estate might be equal priced up front but woods only pays timber money once every few decades while tillable ground pays every year and is flexible what crop goes in. Bottom line is that comparing a sloped hillside of maples, that might not be useful for anything else, to tillable ground is like the proverbial apples and oranges. For ag assessment tax purposes my sugarbush is assessed at one rate and my cornfields on two sides around it are assessed significantly higher. Bottom line is I agree with treefinder. If both parties are happy then all is cool, whether the price is 30 cents or $3 per tap.

[OGDENS SUGAR BUSH]

CHAD
read your post you pay .50 but you would pay 1.00 pay it then

[802maple]

I am not saying anyone that pays a fee less than 1.00 is giving the landowner a raw deal. All I am saying is some sugarmakers think that sugaring on someones land is not worth a 1.00 a tap. I am just pointing out that it is much cheaper than owning your own land.

For instance when I owned my land I was paying in taxes alone for bare land and no buildings, 6000 dollars a year and this was all wood land. All that was on that piece of land was 5000 or so taps which in taxes I was paying 1.20 a tap and that didn't include the morgage or any other improvements that went along with owning that land. True it was an investment but most of that was ate up by capitol gains. So if I was to get back into sugaring again I would have to give deep consideration to even a higher figure per tap if I were to run into the right land, but don't think I wouldn't try for something less as you always have to have room to purchase boiling sodas.

[jcb]

Another way to look at it is we are not taking syrup out of the trees we are taking sap. Maybe we should be paying what that is worth. We are the ones with the investment in the equipment not the landowner. In a good year what dose a tap give you 8 gal. That’s maybe $2.00 if you where to sell it so 25% of that is $.50 just one-way of looking at. If everyone in the deal is happy then it’s a good deal for all.

Jim

[maple flats]

I give 3 qts/100 taps. If they do not need that much syrup or would rather have cash I now pay $.50/tap. The landowner is happy and that is what really counts. When I asked to tap they asked what it was worth to me. A gave the above stated prices and the landowner said WOW!, sounds great. On another front however, I have also loaned them a wheelchair van to them for their free use for their son who was in a near fatal car crash (no broken bones but very serious head trauma) and is still on the road to recovery. They occasionally have to bring it back if we need it for our 2 live in handicapped clients to go to a Dr or dentist, the rest of the time it is parked at their house. This could also be considered rent but not really, because we would do the same even if I did not tap their woods.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

This post is a good discussion and not intended for anyone to get upset with anyone, just good discussion as we are all producers and to bring out points about both sides of the topic. Used to be, you could get permission to hunt almost anywhere 20 to 30 years ago but people didn't take care of things and took advantage of landowners and in a lot of places, it is difficult to get permission to hunt anywhere. Not saying this is happening with maple syrup, just things worth thinking about.

[Russell Lampron]

I am glad that I have all of the taps that I want on my own land. I used to go by the 1 gallon of syrup for 100 taps which at this point comes out to about $.50 per tap. If the land owner is happy with the arrangement that you make with him or her whatever you pay is good enough. Use the same guide lines with all of your land owners so that one doesn't feel slighted.

When my dad used to lease out his trees if he wanted enough syrup to last him for a year he was happy. That was about a gallon and he has a lot of taps in his woods.

[sapman]

Russ, so far that's the deal the owner of the woods I'm setting up wants. Super guy! He tells me to treat the woods like it's my own, and give him a gallon of syrup next year. Tap count could reach as many as 800, half being reds. If he won't take money, I'm planning on giving him cream, candy, nuts, and a gift cert. to a nice restaurant for he and his wife.

Tim

[the old guy]

Hey You Guys! I Take A Different Approach. Making Maple Syrup Is An Art, A Skill. If The Landowner Wants His Raw Goods Made Into A Usable Or Salable Product Then He Should Pay You! Granted If He Furnishes Allthe Raw Goods, Charge Him Less. Afterall, You Can't Use The Corn Or Any Other Raw Good Without Having It Processed, And Believe Me, No Processor Will Pay You To Eat A Box Of Corn Flakes!

The Old Guy

[fred]

soooooooo if you were crop farming on a neighbors land you would also expect him to pay YOU to farm it for yourself when he bought the land and pays the taxes. that makes sense.

[802maple]

I would gladly pay .75 a tap as you couldn't even begin to own land for that. The taxes alone for a piece of land would cost you more than that here in Vermont. Any sugarmaker that thinks by owning his land is getting it cheaper than leasing for .75 cents a tap hasn't crunched the numbers. It would scare the crap out of you if you looked at it as a business and saw the real numbers what owning land versus leasing actually cost you. With a proper setup, if syrup was grossing you $3.00 a lb you would be able to make $15.00 dollars a tap or more. I think I could give the person that owns the trees and is waitng for the first windstorm to totally destroy his woods in a few minutes,up to a dollar of that. Just my opinion.

[halfast tapper]

The problem with leasing , and I have experienced this myself, is that because you don't own the land you don't have control of the land. Even with a contract for x amount of years all it takes is a forester to come and badtalk sugaring and next thing you know they want to log it and you have to move out or loose everything to the skidder and chain saws.
I would in a heart beat give .75 to have a lease that will be there in 5, 10, or 20 years. Problem is that all the orchards are being cut up and sold for developments or logged off.
I have looked into USFS but right now they are not making any new leases, and as far as the state goes just because a couple of bad apples ruined it for the rest of us back in the 70's doesn't mean they shouldn't ever allow tapping on state land again. I believe the state of VT has an obligation to this industry to stay the #1 producer in the US, but if the land keeps getting used up for other reasons we will be lucky to be #1 in 20 years. The state needs to set up a program for tapping state land.
Sorry to get off base a little, it just makes me angry to see nice sugarbushes logged completely off.

[802maple]

That is why you need a iron clad contract and that the sugarmaker does exactly as he agrees too. At that point it can't be done as you had mentioned.

As far as the state goes, it is looking good for some leasing going on their lands, or should I say our lands. There has been alot of headway in the last couple of weeks in that direction. Governor Douglas and Lt. Governor Dubie (who by the way is the brother of a very large sugarmaker) are very much behind this. The feds are still be convinced by the tree huggers that it isn't the right thing to do but maybe they will come around soon.

[the old guy]

Hey Fred

It's Just How You Look At It I Guess. I Grain Farmed For Years When It Was Popular To Share Crop, Then Cash Crop Became More Popular But It All Boiled Down To Who Would Pay What. Mapling Is No Different. One Landowner Only Wants A Few Bottles Of Syrup (actual Money .25 Per Tap) While The Landowner To Our North Likes To Have Cash Money (.75 Per Tap). One Is Easy Access On Level Ground Near A Paved Road, While The Other Has Tree On Steep Slopes In Hard To Get To Terrain. We Try To Treat The Landowners Fairly And What I Said Earlier About Getting Paid For Tapping His Trees Is Just Wishful Thinking. I Suppose A More Fair Way To Rent Would Be The Number Of Gallons Of Sap The Trees Produced. Trees Are Just Like Cropland--some Are More More Productive Than Others.

The Old Guy

[hookhill]

I agree with Halfast Tapper. Vermont has turned into a veneer maple state. Thats all you hear of from foresters, is, veneer maple. First of all, in a 5000ft truckload of logs you might get 200 ft thats veneer money, the rest goes into saw logs or whatever. There are so many stories about sugarers leasing sugar ground and losing the tubing and hard work to skidders. The current use program is all about timber production. Sugaring is an afterthought. The foresters dont make any money from sugaring but they do get a cut from timber sales. The foresters dont go out of thier way to set up current use land for sugaring. If Vermont wants to be #1 in maple production then our political leaders are going to have to make allowances for sugaring.

[michiganfarmer]

Thanks for all the great input

Jim

you gotta 720? Outstandiing! Me too.

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