Laconia man gets OK to tap cemetery maples for their sap

Published Date

LACONIA — Mark Dadian arrived late at the Laconia Parks and Recreation Department's meeting last night because he was attending a welding class at the Huot Regional Technical Education Center, where he's learning a skill which will enable him to build a backyard arch at his Church Street home for making maple syrup.
And he convinced the commission to allow him to tap five maple trees at the Hillside Cemetery off Mechanic Street in Lakeport to provide him with a supply of maple sap for his backyard maple sugar operation.
''I was looking for trees I could tap and located these on city property. They're 30 feet away from the nearest grave and I'd like to tap them this year if that's possible,'' said Dadian, who said that he would have tubes connected to collection buckets which would be set well away from the graves.
Commission members were intrigued by the idea and agreed to allow him to tap the trees once he had submitted a written formal proposal.
Commissioners said that they will review what happens with the tree tapping operation to try and develop a policy but hope they won't be inundated with hundreds of requests from other backyard maple syrup hobbyists.
Dadian said he had no idea how much syrup he will be able to produce, given that the season is so weather dependent, but estimated it would probably be in the vicinity of five gallons at the most.