Maple sugaring in Monroe County, Michigan
- Sap starts
- Feb 16
- typical year
- Season ends
- Mar 22
- about 5 weeks
- Sap days / season
- 33.2
- 1991–2026 average
- Taps, 2022
- 495
- #59 of 66 in MI
Sap-flow outlook at Monroe right now
Full Michigan forecast →Forecast for Monroe, MI
Updated Oct 6, 9:49 AM EDT
Off-season for now. Sap needs freezing nights, and none are in sight. Monroe County's season usually opens around February 16, which is 133 days away.
No freeze-thaw days in the forecast
freeze thaw 32°F
- WedOct 751° / 74°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - ThuOct 850° / 68°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - FriOct 944° / 67°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - SatOct 1047° / 70°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - SunOct 1154° / 74°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - MonOct 1254° / 72°No refreeze forecast
Data: National Weather Service. Verdicts use freeze-thaw thresholds from maple field research; your woods may run a little differently.
When the sap runs
The sugaring calendar at Monroe
Year-to-year spread
- Opening signal
- Median Feb 20; the middle half of seasons fell between Feb 9 and Feb 27. Earliest Feb 1 (2000), latest Mar 8 (2014).
- Closing signal
- Median Mar 25; middle half between Mar 13 and Mar 31. Earliest Feb 17 (2017), latest Apr 6 (2014).
- Sap days by month
- Dec21%Jan15%Feb22%Mar33%Apr10%May0%
36 seasons of sap weather
Monroe County seasons, 1991–2026
Maple production
Monroe County in the Census of Agriculture
USDA counts maple operations every five years. In Monroe County the 2022 Census found 5 farms making syrup (+25% since 2017), with taps +221% and syrup output +1025% over the same five years. That works out to about 0.36 gallons of syrup per tap in 2022 (0.10 in 2017). Among the 385 counties in this atlas, Monroe County ranks 314 by taps.
| Census year | Farms | Taps | Gallons of syrup | Gal / tap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 5 | 495 | 180 | 0.36 |
| 2017 | 4 | 154 | 16 | 0.10 |
Nearby
Neighboring maple counties
31 mi · Ann Arbor, MI
Washtenaw County
Sap ~Feb 19 – Mar 27 · 6,370 taps
33 mi · Adrian, MI
Lenawee County
Sap ~Feb 18 – Mar 24 · 408 taps
40 mi · Bowling Green, OH
Wood County
Sap ~Feb 22 – Mar 29 · 15 taps
50 mi · Pontiac, MI
Oakland County
Sap ~Feb 22 – Mar 27 · 1,127 taps
54 mi · Mount Clemens, MI
Macomb County
Sap ~Feb 18 – Mar 23 · 132 taps
56 mi · Jackson, MI
Jackson County
Sap ~Feb 21 – Mar 27 · 579 taps
About these numbers
The season dates are estimated from 36 seasons of daily high and low temperatures for the PRISM 4-km grid cell at Monroe (597ft), scored with the same freeze-thaw rule as our live forecast: a sap day is an overnight low under 30.2 °F followed by an afternoon high over 37.4 °F. Each season's closing signal is the last sap day before accumulated warmth reaches a threshold, and the opening signal sits five weeks before that, never earlier than the first real freeze-thaw week. Tested against 117 state-seasons of USDA-reported dates, the rule lands within 5.5 days of the reported close and 6.6 days of the reported opening on average, and the typical dates shown here are scaled to Michigan's USDA record (12 years). Production figures are copied from the Census as published. Full method, calibration tables and the downloadable dataset →
Sources · 6
- 1.2022 Census of Agriculture, County Level Data — Michigan, Table 37: Maple Syrup, 2022 and 2017 · USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service
- 2.PRISM daily temperature grids (AN81d, 4 km), accessed 2026-10-05 · PRISM Group, Oregon State University, https://prism.oregonstate.edu
- 3.Applied Climate Information System (ACIS) web services · NOAA Regional Climate Centers
- 4.USDA NASS maple syrup reports — approximate average season opened and closed dates, 2011–2022 · USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (mirrored by the University of Vermont)
- 5.Sap flow in sugar maple: timing and weather drivers (Frontiers in Agronomy, 2025) · de Lima Santos et al.
- 6.GeoNames gazetteer (cities500), CC BY 4.0 · GeoNames
FAQ
Monroe County sugaring questions
- When should I tap maple trees in Monroe County, Michigan?
- In a typical year the sap starts running around February 16 near Monroe and the season winds down around March 22. Have your taps in a day or two before the first forecast string of freezing nights and 40 °F days. In the past 36 seasons the weather signal came as early as Feb 1 and as late as Mar 8.
- How much maple syrup does Monroe County produce?
- The 2022 Census of Agriculture counted 5 maple operations in Monroe County with 495 taps producing 180 gallons of syrup, ranking 59 of 66 Michigan's counties with published tap counts.
- How many sap days does Monroe County get in a season?
- On average 33.2 freeze-thaw sap days from December through May at Monroe, of which about 14.1 are textbook days with a night in the 20s and a day in the 40s. The best season since 1991 was 2018 (46 sap days); the leanest was 2003 (18).
- Where do these dates come from?
- From 36 seasons of daily high and low temperatures at Monroe (PRISM 4-km grid), scored with the same freeze-thaw rule as our live forecast, then calibrated against USDA's reported season dates for Michigan. They describe a typical year at one point in the county; your sugarbush, slope and elevation can shift them by days.


