It was about 1966 when my dad and I walked into a Fort Francis, Canada snow shoe factory to buy my first and still only set of Alaskan Trail shoes. We walked out with the 60 inch by 10 inch snow shoes with their varnished frames and gut webbing still tacky. This was before the days of snowmobile trails and my dad wanted to give me an opportunity to venture out into our deer hunting woods late in the winter to learn the lay of the land and gain more independence as a young hunter. In those days, my tracks were the only human tracks for miles during winter. As late winter grew hard on the local deer herd, with the new shoes, I was able to join in on brush-cutting efforts to help the weakened deer through until spring settled in and allowed them to venture out of the deer yards. Everyone had "trail" shoes back then. The long and narrow shoes allowed for faster travel with little effort. Of course, nowadays, deer yards as we knew them then, are no longer in most parts, as snow sled and groomed trails allow the deer to roam as far as they need to for late winter browse. Add the ATV to the mix and the need of my trail shoes have all but gone.
The First Step Of The Long Run
With the temps warming during the day above freezing, the spring tradition of "sapping" is not far away.
But that all said, the sapping season isn't far off. And for a few short hours, the old trail shoes, now with the varnish worn off from tip to toe, come off the shelf as part of the first step toward tapping the trees. The long, narrow trail shoes trek from hard maple to hard maple, creating a groove of sorts into the deep snow. With the sun high and warm these coming days, the vertical walls of snow created by the stomping down of the big shoes, will absorb that warmth and melt a path throughout the Sugarbush. Instead of having to haul buckets of heavy sap down a path of foot prints over a foot deep in the snow, a nice flat path, leaves exposed, will make life a lot sweeter. In the Sugarbush, "sweeter" is a good thing. Aging legs, although stressed by the big shoes breaking trail early on, appreciate the smooth paths later on.
So as the big sheet of ice to the south of our perch is now quiet, the wealth of hard maples to the north become a bustling, steam filled early spring tradition. Sure, it could be at least 2 more weeks before the liquid gold flows 60 to 100 drops a minute, but it's now time to take the old trail shoes out for the first step of the process. Contact Steve Fellegy at sf1954@embarqmail.com or 651-270-3383
