Megquier Hill Farm established 1791.
The Maine Maple Sunday celebration takes place at his Megquier Hill Farm on 260 Megquier Hill Road in Poland. This years event will be held on Sunday March 28th form 9am to 3pm. There is no charge to visit and tour the Sugar House. We will offer free sampling of numerous maple sugar products. We also will be offering a pancake breakfast all day for kids and adults for a fee, not sure at this time what the price is. Visitors will be entertained by Emmit Picket, played by Barney Martin of the Maine Hysterical Society and the Grassholes Band. Free hay wagon rides will be offered from the farm to the sugar house that sits behind the farm. It was a load of fun last year and we are all excited for a repeat performance. Special discount coupons will be handed out that can be used at Harvest Hill Farms in our Farm Market and in our Farmhouse Pizza and Deli on Rte 26 in Mechanic Falls.
Sugar House Megquier Hill
Tree tap tubing.
Peter, owner of Harvest Hill Farms, actually has 3 Sugar Houses. One each in Poland, Buckfield and Byron Maine. All totaled he is tapping about 1400 acres of sugar bush. Most of the operations use tubing to connect each tree to a vast network of piping that connects the trees to the Sugar house. The general rule of thumb is that a maple with a girth of 10" at check height would have one tap on it. As the girth increase, so do the number of taps. It's important to note that they take great care in the process of tapping the trees as they do no want to harm them in any way, shape or manner.
Sugar House Megquier Hill
As you can see in the pix, it is quite hi tech. The big commercial boiler shown is the size of a locomotive and located up in Byron, Maine(It is not open to the public). Here the sap comes into the Sugar house and is put through Reverse Osmosis which takes much of the water out of the sap, leaving a higher concentration of sap resulting in more maple syrup per gallon of tree sap. Ultimately the sap is shipped specially designed 40 gallon containers to the different companies that bottle the syrup.
Maple Sap Boiler
Maple Candy Table at the Maine Maple Sunday.
Text and photos by Harvest Hill Farms owned by Kathie and Peter Bolduc.
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