A maple tree gives about 5 to 15 gallons of sap per tap over a sugaring season, and 10 gallons is the usual rule of thumb. Boil that down and you get roughly a quart of syrup. The real numbers move with the tree, the weather and the year.
Sugar makers count by the tap
Most figures you'll find are per tap, not per tree, because one tree can carry more than one tap.
A maple has to be about 40 years old before it's big enough to tap. That's generally 10 to 12 inches across, says the Vermont Maple Sugar Makers' Association. University of Maine Extension suggests one tap for trees 10 to 18 inches across and a second from 18 inches. Trees over 25 inches can take a third, if they're in very good shape.
Don't expect taps beyond those guidelines to mean extra sap, though. Cornell's maple program warns against over-tapping, because a tree only has so much sap. The program compares it to a bucket: drill one hole or ten, and the same amount runs out. For a one-tap tree, the per-tap number is the per-tree number.
How much sap one tap gives
Sap doesn't flow every day of the season. It comes in runs, each one set off by a freezing night and a thaw.
Each run adds a little. A taphole usually gives a quart to a gallon per run. Some runs give less and some give several gallons, depending on the tree, the weather and how long the run lasts.
Add up the runs and the season totals land close together:
- University of New Hampshire Extension: about a gallon per run and 8 to 10 runs, so 8 to 10 gallons a season.
- Massachusetts Maple Producers Association: about 10 gallons over a 4 to 5 week season.
- University of Minnesota Extension: 10 to 12 gallons a season.
- University of Maine Extension and the USDA Forest Service: 5 to 15 gallons in a typical season.
Those are averages, not ceilings. Under the right conditions, one taphole can give 40 to 60 gallons by Maine's numbers.
How much syrup that makes
Syrup is sap with most of the water boiled away. Sap is only about 2 percent sugar, so you need a lot of it. The Vermont association puts the average at about 40 gallons of sap per gallon of syrup, and anywhere from 20 to 100 depending on the sap.
Sugar makers do the math with the Jones Rule of 86. Divide 86 by the sap's sugar percentage, and you get the gallons of sap per gallon of syrup. UNH Extension runs the numbers: 43 gallons at 2 percent, about 34 at 2.5 percent, and about 29 at 3 percent.
So a typical tap, at about 10 gallons of sap, makes about a quart of syrup. That's the rule of thumb. It's the Massachusetts association's figure, and University of Maine Extension lands in the same place: roughly a quarter gallon per tap with good practices. Recent USDA averages run a little higher.
Why one tree gives more than another
Where a maple grows matters. Cornell's maple program says trees in the open, along roads or in lawns, grow big crowns without competition. They make more sap, and sweeter sap, than trees in a forest. An open-grown tree can make half a gallon of syrup in a season from 15 to 20 gallons of sap. A forest tree generally makes about a quart, from about 10 gallons.
Size and species count too. Big trees usually give more sap per tap than small ones, Cornell notes, and sugar maple sap generally has more sugar than other maples. Sweetness also varies widely from one tree to the next. A USDA Forest Service summary says a sweet tree tends to stay sweet year after year.
Sweetness changes the math a lot. By Cornell's numbers, sap at 4 percent sugar, which a big open-grown sugar maple can reach, needs about 22 gallons per gallon of syrup. Sap at 1 percent, seen in silver maples and crowded red maples, needs 86. Both line up with the Jones Rule above.
Why no two seasons match
- The weather. Sap flow depends heavily on it. A spring with fewer freezes and thaws means fewer runs, and less sap.
- The year. Sap sugar shifts between runs and from one year to the next, Cornell says. Even last summer counts: the Forest Service summary links warmer summers to less sugar in the next spring's sap. University of Maine Extension adds that sap yield varies greatly from season to season.
- The setup. Tubing on vacuum pulls more sap from each tap. Cornell cites research showing 50 to 150 percent more yield, depending on the season.
What sugar makers average
The USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service reports syrup yield per tap by state. In 2026, US producers averaged 0.36 gallons of syrup per tap, a bit more than a third of a gallon, across about 16.5 million taps. That works out to about 1.4 quarts a tap, more than the rule-of-thumb quart. Many sugar makers now run their tubing on vacuum to pull more sap.
Vermont had about 8.2 million of those taps and made a little over half the country's syrup. Its taps averaged 0.38 gallons each. That's roughly 48 fluid ounces, or about six of our 8 fl oz tins, from one tap in a season.
State averages show the spread. In 2026 they ran from about 0.16 gallons per tap in West Virginia to 0.44 in Wisconsin. Connecticut shows the swing from year to year: about 0.19 gallons per tap in 2024, 0.15 in 2025, then back up to 0.19 in 2026.
From one Vermont forest
Our syrup is tapped from one Vermont forest and boiled over a wood-burning fire, with nothing added. Amber is warm and smooth with caramel notes, the one that goes on everything. Dark is deep and robust, built for cooking and baking. Shop Amber and Dark, or get one of each in the bundle.
