Somerskogen Sugarbush is a family owned and operated maple syrup farm located in Minnetrista, Minnesota. We have been making 100% pure maple syrup on 17 acres of maple forest since 1994. We started out with 23 taps that dripped into plastic bags, but now have 800 taps connected to a high powered vacuum pump. Every year leads to new improvements and innovations in the sugarbush. We enjoy sharing what we have learned and hope that this website will be helpful to maple syrup makers and others interested in learning more about nature’s finest sweetener.

The Reverse Osmosis Machine

by Peter 9/11/2010 10:47:00 PM

The reverse osmosis machine is about the size of a small refrigerator.  The tall metal cylinder in back is what holds the membrane that filters out some of the excess water and keeps the sugar.  It is able to do this because sugar molecules are much larger than water molecules.

Installed tanks

by Peter 9/11/2010 10:45:00 PM

The near tank is 1000 gallons and the far tank is 600 gallons.

Sap Collection Improvements

by Peter 9/11/2010 10:37:00 PM

We installed two new tanks that will be used to feed sap to the reverse osmosis (RO) machine that we will use next year.  The RO concentrates the sap from 2% sugar to 8% sugar, reducing the amount of time needed to boil the sap before it becomes syrup.