McCloud to host Maple Syrup Days

Starting this weekend, McCloud Nature Park will be hosting the third annual McCloud Maple Syrup Days, which runs for two weekends, Saturdays and Sundays, Feb. 23-24 and March 2-3.

Various maple syrup-making demonstrations such as Native American and pioneer methods, hands-on tree tapping practice and maple tree identification pointers will be on-going.

Making authentic maple syrup starts in a sugar bush, a group of maple trees that are tapped for their sap, which is collected in buckets then transferred to an evaporator for cooking.

Sap from Sugar Maples is watery but has high sugar content and can be boiled down into maple syrup. This historic process, called maple sugaring, will be conducted at McCloud prior to and during the educational programs being offered to the public on the two weekends.

Thanks to contributions over many weeks by the parks department's volunteer force, many gallons of sticky-sweet authentic maple syrup will be sampled by park visitors while witnessing a lost art first mastered by Native Americans.

For centuries, Indians tapped maples, gashed the bark under the tap in a V-shape and put out large birch bark bowls under the tap for collection.

Earlier Indians would pour the sap into a hollowed-out log, birch bark or clay kettle and drop hot rocks into the cooking vat until most of the water was boiled away.

Later Indians improved the process by pouring the sap into a clay or iron kettle held over a campfire which led to a better product where the maple flavor was more pronounced.

Maple Syrup Days will offer free tours, which begin at the Nature Center every hour, on the hour beginning Saturday, Feb. 23 at 10 a.m.-4 p .m., Sunday, Feb. 24 from 1-4 p.m., Saturday, March 2 from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. and Sunday, March 3 from 1-4 p.m.

Also on Saturday and Sunday, March 2-3, the fifth annual Pancake Breakfast Fundraiser will be held at McCloud Nature Park benefiting the Parks Foundation of Hendricks County.

Guests will get to devour pancakes topped with freshly made McCloud maple syrup while making a donation supporting Hendricks County Parks. On Saturday, seating times start at 8 a.m. and continue on the hour until 3 p.m. Sunday, seating times are on the hour from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Reservations are required and can be made by calling the parks department's main office at (317) 718-6188.

The breakfast is a fundraiser and free-will donations can be made on location using cash or check.