How Warm Winter Weather Could Affect Maple Syrup Supplies

Why is everything ruining our favorite breakfast foods?

First, it was the skyrocketing price of eggs, which reached an all-time high since they began to rise towards the end of 2022. Now it could be another breakfast staple: maple syrup.

While egg prices can be partly explained by the many cases of bird flu sweeping the US, there is a completely different natural phenomenon affecting the production of maple syrup. The warm, mild winters that most of us enjoy are not really suitable for maple farms.

New York is second only to Vermont in maple syrup production, and February is usually harvest time. At White Oak Farm in Yorktown, the southernmost commercial maple syrup farm in the state, unseasonably warm weather (when temperatures reached 60 degrees Celsius on Friday) robbed them of cold water production.

“When we see a tree open and bloom, it’s a sign for us that the maple season is over,” said owner Bree Hart, who has run the farm for 40 years.

He said his 2,400 trees needed frost at night to get sugar supplies. But it doesn’t happen as often as usual, which means the maple syrup season, which usually lasts several weeks, won’t come close to it.

“If we only had a three- or four-day season or a week, two weeks, we could cut it in half,” Hart said.

Some of the large bottles produced on the farm require 80 gallons of juice to make. So when the faucets run dry, can prices go up?

“It’s too early to talk about it right now,” Hart said.

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Manufacturers in upstate New York and Vermont started production early, hoping to have enough stock on the shelves, and celebrate “Maple Weekend” at the end of March. White Oak Farm will host events for which tickets are available on their website.

“We’ll have tours, pancake breakfasts, tastings, food vendors,” Hart said.

The farm is hoping that Mother Nature will work together over the next few weeks to get as much syrup from the trees as possible, so the festival is a success.