Owner Mike Moore walks into the evaporator room at Sunnyside Maples in Loudon Friday as the tempertures were ideal for sap running.
Owner Mike Moore walks into the evaporator room at Sunnyside Maples in Loudon Friday as the tempertures were ideal for sap running. Credit: GEOFF FORESTER—Monitor staff

With cold nights and moderate temperatures this week, the sap has been running hard at Sunnyside Maples in Loudon. Owner Mike Moore has been busy in his sap house along Route 106 where it takes between 30 and 50 gallons of evaporated sap to make one gallon of syrup. Sap sweetness changes from season to season – and even within a season – so the amount of sap required to make that gallon of syrup varies. Moore, 51, along with his 83-year-old father, Richard, are part of a four-generation maple syruping family operation located across from New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Temperatures between 25 and 40 degrees is optimum for sap to run and Moore says that means March is the best time for syruping. But temperatures are plunging this weekend, so Moore said he’ll be doing other chores. “I’ll be splitting wood all weekend.”