Successful maple syrup season celebrated at 49th annual Perth Festival of the Maples

It’s been a great year for maple syrup producers in eastern Ontario, who gathered in Perth on Saturday to celebrate. CTV’s Jack Richardson has the details.

For nearly five decades, maple syrup producers in eastern Ontario have convened in Perth, Ont. on the last Saturday in April for a festival to signal the end of the tree tapping season in the region.

The 49th annual Perth Festival of the Maples had an upbeat vibe despite the rainy conditions because most of the producers had some of their best production seasons ever.

“This year is one of the best in our record,” said Andrew Mackey, the owner of Temple’s Sugar Bush, a maple syrup producer in the region for 36 years.

“We make syrup just north of here in McDonald’s Corners, kind of the maple syrup capital of Ontario. Lanark County is. We’re in the heart of it.”

The season starts when daytime temperatures are above freezing, but nighttime temperatures still fall below 0 C, allowing the sap to flow through the maple trees.

Mark Youmans has been tapping trees at Salmon River Sugar Bush northwest of Kingston for 15 years. 2025 was his best season to date.

“Our previous year, we were around 1.8 litres a tap. We were over two litres this year,” he said.

Leann Thompson, owner of Thompsontown Maple Products, said no matter how strong the tapping season was, the Festival of the Maples is a critical day on the calendar for business.

“We see repeat customers who come here every year to visit our booth,” said Thompson. “We see that carryover into people finding us in stores.”

The festival serves as an unofficial conclusion to the tapping season every year, but there were only about a dozen sugar bushes set up as vendors.

The rest were other local businesses looking to take advantage of one of the larger crowds the town of roughly 7,000 people sees all year.

The festival’s Chair, Brian Perkin, said anywhere between 15,000 to 20,000 people will visit Perth for the festival.

“It’s not a big town, but it always grows during the Festival of the Maples. And this is our 49th edition, so we’re gearing up for a big 50th next year,” Perkin said.