NEWBURGH, Maine — On the heels of a weekend storm that knocked out power for more than 180,000 Mainers, sugar shacks across the state still managed to open their doors for the finale of Maine Maple Sunday Weekend.
Crowds flocked to farms big and small for sap boiling demonstrations, maple sweets, and syrup on snow—an old winter staple made possible by Saturday's accumulation.
At Nutkin Knoll Farm in Newburgh, the weekend offered the Price family, who owns the property, a chance to reflect on a successful season, which isn't quite over yet.
"I look around and I’m just full of pride," Kelsey Price, the heir apparent of the farm said Sunday. "I'm full of pride because the community loves us so much."
Kelsey says output from the trees this year was strong, albeit unpredictable with mild weather.
"Things are just a little bit more unstable. Going forward, I think we'll have to think about that," Kelsey said Sunday.
While the recent warmer-than-average winters, with their mild days and colder nights, have helped the Prices boost production, the weather has changed the calculus of sugaring in general.
"[The season is] three or four weeks earlier than it was. The seasons have become more compressed, the weather wilder," Len Price, Kelsey’s dad and the co-owner of Nutkin Knoll explained.
As a result, this year's Maine Maple Sunday Weekend came towards the end of the maple season at the farm. According to Len, some years production hadn't even started by the fourth Sunday in March.
But as the industry contends with change, the enthusiasm for Maine's bond to maple appeared undimmed.
As Allison Johnson, who came to Nutkin Knoll Farm on Sunday put it, "It's cherished, particularly here in Maine and by my family. And I get to bring my friends and share that with people."