![]() The beech syrup had a mild, sweet flavor-almost indistinguishable, at least to this reporter, from maple syrup. “I’m always interested to see what people think of it.” “Let’s start with the beech,” Moore said, pouring a caramel-colored spoonful. Beech sap steams down into syrup in a pot in Lee. Part of Moore’s study at UNH aims to find the best processing techniques for these more finicky, less tested saps.įor a taste test, he produced two tiny glass bottles-one of birch syrup he made a few years ago, and one of beech syrup from New York-based New Leaf, run by Moore’s friend Mike Farrell. In the driveway of his house in Lee, he was steaming off some beech and sycamore syrup in big metal pots-the way maple syrup is boiled in a sugar shack. “But once I figured it out, I started tapping a lot more trees and selling syrup, and it turned out to be pretty good tasting syrup.” “The first year or two were a real learning curve for me,” Moore said. It took a while for him fine-tune the process – these species don’t like all the same temperatures and equipment as maples. Moore did that successfully for six years with his business, the Crooked Chimney, which sold syrups like birch and beech at farmers markets and to restaurants. “If you can think of some economical use-if you can make syrup from them, that would be a nice way to actually generate a little profit from them,” Moore said. It’s found throughout New Hampshire’s forests, farms and sugar bushes-almost like a tree weed. ![]() So Moore sees untapped potential in other common species, like the American beech. Researchers say monocultures, like the all-maple syrup industry, are more at risk from climate change, pests and other unpredictable threats. Nearby, a bucket collected the resulting sap, while other equipment gathered weather data. “You can see I have three trees with sensors here that are all tied back to one data logger,” Moore said, pointing to the tubes and wires running from the beech trunks. Sap flow sensors gather data from a beech tree in Lee. UNH researcher David Moore had sensors plugged into a stand of beech trees to measure that sap and the conditions helping produce it. They want to create new markets for an industry that, right now, depends on just one kind of tree-making it vulnerable to disease and climate change.Īt the tail end of maple sugaring season, other kinds of sap were still flowing freely in the woods of Lee. Researchers at the University of New Hampshire are studying new ways to make syrup out of the northern forest-not from maple trees, but from beeches, birches, sycamores and more. ![]() This story was reported by Annie Ropeik on NHPR. This segment is part of The State of Science, a series featuring science stories from public radio stations across the United States. New Hampshire sycamore sap boils down into syrup at researcher David Moore’s house in Lee.
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