Maple sugaring in Blair County, Pennsylvania
- Sap starts
- Feb 18
- typical year
- Season ends
- Mar 18
- about 4 weeks
- Sap days / season
- 46.4
- 1991–2026 average
- Taps, 2022
- 1,386
- #25 of 45 in PA
Sap-flow outlook at Hollidaysburg right now
Full Pennsylvania forecast →Forecast for Hollidaysburg, PA
Updated Oct 6, 8:31 AM EDT
Off-season for now. Sap needs freezing nights, and none are in sight. Blair County's season usually opens around February 18, which is 135 days away.
No freeze-thaw days in the forecast
freeze thaw 32°F
- WedOct 741° / 72°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - ThuOct 854° / 72°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - FriOct 945° / 68°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - SatOct 1044° / 71°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - SunOct 1148° / 70°
0h below · 24h above
No refreeze forecast - MonOct 1253° / 71°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 Hollidaysburg
Year-to-year spread
- Opening signal
- Median Feb 13; the middle half of seasons fell between Feb 2 and Feb 21. Earliest Jan 12 (2023), latest Mar 3 (2013).
- Closing signal
- Median Mar 15; middle half between Mar 5 and Mar 25. Earliest Feb 15 (2023), latest Apr 7 (2013).
- Sap days by month
- Dec23%Jan17%Feb22%Mar28%Apr10%May0%
36 seasons of sap weather
Blair County seasons, 1991–2026
Maple production
Blair County in the Census of Agriculture
USDA counts maple operations every five years. In Blair County the 2022 Census found 11 farms making syrup (+38% since 2017), with taps -31% and syrup output +9% over the same five years. That works out to about 0.27 gallons of syrup per tap in 2022 (0.17 in 2017). Among the 385 counties in this atlas, Blair County ranks 266 by taps.
| Census year | Farms | Taps | Gallons of syrup | Gal / tap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 11 | 1,386 | 379 | 0.27 |
| 2017 | 8 | 1,997 | 349 | 0.17 |
Nearby
Neighboring maple counties
29 mi · Bedford, PA
Bedford County
Sap ~Feb 19 – Mar 21 · 10,658 taps
42 mi · Clearfield, PA
Clearfield County
Sap ~Feb 26 – Mar 29 · 1,010 taps
42 mi · Indiana, PA
Indiana County
Sap ~Feb 17 – Mar 20 · 6,343 taps
46 mi · Bellefonte, PA
Centre County
Sap ~Feb 21 – Mar 23 · 4,800 taps
46 mi · Somerset, PA
Somerset County
Sap ~Feb 25 – Mar 27 · 295,430 taps
51 mi · Chambersburg, PA
Franklin County
Sap ~Feb 8 – Mar 10 · 1,309 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 Hollidaysburg (1,070ft), 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 Pennsylvania'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 — Pennsylvania, 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
Blair County sugaring questions
- When should I tap maple trees in Blair County, Pennsylvania?
- In a typical year the sap starts running around February 18 near Hollidaysburg and the season winds down around March 18. 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 Jan 12 and as late as Mar 3.
- How much maple syrup does Blair County produce?
- The 2022 Census of Agriculture counted 11 maple operations in Blair County with 1,386 taps producing 379 gallons of syrup, ranking 25 of 45 Pennsylvania's counties with published tap counts.
- How many sap days does Blair County get in a season?
- On average 46.4 freeze-thaw sap days from December through May at Hollidaysburg, of which about 17.2 are textbook days with a night in the 20s and a day in the 40s. The best season since 1991 was 2012 (61 sap days); the leanest was 2003 (26).
- Where do these dates come from?
- From 36 seasons of daily high and low temperatures at Hollidaysburg (PRISM 4-km grid), scored with the same freeze-thaw rule as our live forecast, then calibrated against USDA's reported season dates for Pennsylvania. They describe a typical year at one point in the county; your sugarbush, slope and elevation can shift them by days.


