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Better Farming Ontario Featured Articles

Better Farming Ontario magazine is published 11 times per year. After each edition is published, we share featured articles online.


Sweet gadgets for modern maple syrup farming

Friday, June 6, 2014

A farmer's dissatisfaction with the status quo has led to new software that can help maple syrup farmers remotely monitor leaks using smartphones.

Doug Thompson, owner of Thompson's Maple Products in Hilton Beach, Ont., has kept up with the changes in the industry during his 37 years of production. But when it came to finding leaks in the plastic tubing that draws sap from the trees, he was stuck in the past.

"We used to have a man, full-time, the whole season walking the bush," Thompson told the Financial Post. Leaks can be caused by anything from falling branches knocking the tubing loose to animals chewing the line.

Existing monitoring systems all used sensors attached to wires, which could also be disrupted. So, according to the Sault Star, Thompson contacted a local computer company and found salesperson and electronics hobbyist Trevor Bryant. Together they developed Tap Track Technologies, a wireless system that uses solar-battery-powered radio-unit boxes strapped to trees to monitor line pressure. The information is transmitted in real time to a computer or smartphone and displays as a map of all the lines, with green dots indicating good sap flow and red dots showing leaks. Text messages immediately alert producers to problem lines.

The Associated Press reports that the system costs $1 to $2 per tap. Tap Track's website boasts a return on investment within the first season. Thompson's Maple Products won the Premier's Award for Agri-food Innovation Excellence in 2013. BF

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