Tim Custer (right) owner of Custer Maple in Cuyler Shows Eric Mulvihill of the Cortland County Business Development Corporation Some of the Equipment purchased with a grant from the BDC’s Small Business Expansion Program.
Cuyler NY- Tim Custer and his family have been collecting sap and turning it into maple syrup for more than 80 years. Custer has seen the business grow from just a few hundred taps and stainless-steel buckets to 15,000 taps all connected with nearly 60 miles of vacuum tubing.
The sweet business requires a lot of patience and hard work. Custer and his family start preparing for the maple production season in October with the bulk of the sap collection and boiling occurring from January until the beginning of May. It takes five gallons of sap to produce one gallon of syrup.
Over the years the collection and boiling process has become very sophisticated and high tech. Custer uses a reverse osmosis system to remove as much water as possible before running the sap through the evaporator. Heis company uses a vacuum system to draw sap from the maple trees rather than wait for that slow drip; Mother Nature still runs the show though with wild swings in temperatures knowing when the sap will run is an ever-changing landscape.
To keep track of his fifteen thousand taps and better predict when the sap will flow Custer has invested in a Smart Track vacuum monitoring system that places real timing monitors in his sugar bush. The transmitters send data on the temperatures in the woods and real time information on how well the sap is flowing. Custer says it allows him to detect leaks or loose taps within a thousand feet of the leaks. This obviously saves time and improves production.
Using $10,000 in grant funding for the Cortland County Business Development Corporation’s Small business assistance program Custer was able to improve the vacuum tapping system with more efficient pumps as well as add additional sap lines and add more data trackers to his system. Custer said it was nice to see some of the federal COVID response funds made available to a small operator like himself.
Custer expects to produce 4500 gallons of maple syrup this year with a corresponding value of approximately $100,000.
Note: The Cortland County Business Development Corporation is publishing a series of stories highlighting the small businesses that received funding from Cortland County’s American Rescue funds allocation. The BDC was tasked with distributing $600,000 in funds to qualified small businesses.
