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Quebec · maple atlas

Maple sugaring in La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau, Quebec

La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau is a regional county municipality (MRC) in Quebec. Statistics Canada's 2021 Census of Agriculture counted 11 farms reporting maple taps and 104,300 taps here. Around Maniwaki, sap usually runs from March 16 to April 23. Here's the long-run pattern, 35 seasons of sap weather, and the outlook this week.
Too early to tapAbout 160 days until the usual start.
Sap starts
Mar 16
producers' record
Season ends
Apr 23
about 5 weeks
Sap days / season
34.8
1991–2025 average
Taps, 2021
104,300
#49 of 61 in QC

Sap-flow outlook at Maniwaki right now

Full Quebec forecast →

Forecast for Maniwaki, QC

Updated Oct 7, 11:30 AM EDT

1 sap day in the next 6

freeze thaw 0 °C

  1. ThuOct 8
    8° / 13°
    No refreeze forecast
  2. FriOct 9
    5° / 11°
    No refreeze forecast
  3. SatOct 10
    -2° / 10°
    Sap likely
  4. SunOct 11
    7° / 23°
    Run tapering
  5. MonOct 12
    10° / 17°
    No refreeze forecast
  6. TueOct 13
    8° / 12°
    No refreeze forecast

Data: Environment and Climate Change Canada. Verdicts use freeze-thaw thresholds from maple field research; your woods may run a little differently.

When the sap runs

The sugaring calendar at Maniwaki

Freeze-thaw weather at Maniwaki peaks in the weeks of Mar 16 to Apr 20, which hold about 55% of a season's sap days. April is the busiest month. Typical dates are anchored to producers' reported season in the region (Houle et al. 2015, 1999–2011): this division's weather signals, moved 6.8 days earlier for the opening and 1.4 for the closing, the average gap to that record. The spread and the year-by-year bars below are the unadjusted weather signal.
Typical season: Mar 16 – Apr 230246Week of Dec 1: 0.7 sap days on averageWeek of Dec 8: 0.7 sap days on averageWeek of Dec 15: 0.6 sap days on averageWeek of Dec 22: 0.5 sap days on averageWeek of Dec 29: 0.3 sap days on averageWeek of Jan 5: 0.3 sap days on averageWeek of Jan 12: 0.3 sap days on averageWeek of Jan 19: 0.3 sap days on averageWeek of Jan 26: 0.3 sap days on averageWeek of Feb 2: 0.7 sap days on averageWeek of Feb 9: 0.5 sap days on averageWeek of Feb 16: 0.7 sap days on averageWeek of Feb 23: 1.1 sap days on averageWeek of Mar 2: 1.4 sap days on averageWeek of Mar 9: 2.0 sap days on averageWeek of Mar 16: 2.4 sap days on averageWeek of Mar 23: 2.8 sap days on averageWeek of Mar 30: 3.5 sap days on averageWeek of Apr 6: 3.8 sap days on averageWeek of Apr 13: 3.5 sap days on averageWeek of Apr 20: 3.1 sap days on averageWeek of Apr 27: 2.3 sap days on averageWeek of May 4: 1.4 sap days on averageWeek of May 11: 0.8 sap days on averageWeek of May 18: 0.4 sap days on averageWeek of May 25: 0.3 sap days on averageDecJanFebMarAprMaytaps in ~Mar 16
Average number of freeze-thaw sap days in each week of the season at Maniwaki, 1991–2025 (Daymet temperatures). A sap day is an overnight low under −1 °C (30.2 °F) followed by an afternoon high over +3 °C (37.4 °F). The shaded band is the typical season.

Year-to-year spread

Opening signal
Median Mar 23; the middle half of seasons fell between Mar 19 and Mar 28. Earliest Mar 2 (2010), latest Apr 2 (1992).
Closing signal
Median Apr 24; middle half between Apr 19 and Apr 29. Earliest Mar 30 (2010), latest May 7 (1996).
Sap days by month
Dec7%Jan4%Feb9%Mar29%Apr41%May10%

35 seasons of sap weather

La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau seasons, 1991–2025

The best sap year at Maniwaki was 2020 with 57 freeze-thaw days; the leanest was 2008 with 23. Seasons that start early tend to end early too: the trees run on the swing between freezing nights and mild days, and heat ends it.
JanFebMarAprMaysap days20252025: Mar 25 – Apr 29, 39 sap days3920242024: Mar 9 – Apr 12, 46 sap days4620232023: Mar 21 – Apr 20, 32 sap days3220222022: Mar 22 – Apr 23, 43 sap days4320212021: Mar 9 – Apr 7, 36 sap days3620202020: Mar 28 – Apr 30, 57 sap days5720192019: Mar 31 – Apr 29, 27 sap days2720182018: Apr 1 – May 1, 38 sap days3820172017: Mar 19 – Apr 23, 31 sap days3120162016: Mar 30 – May 4, 45 sap days4520152015: Mar 25 – Apr 25, 25 sap days2520142014: Mar 28 – Apr 25, 27 sap days2720132013: Mar 24 – Apr 23, 29 sap days2920122012: Mar 8 – Apr 7, 31 sap days3120112011: Mar 24 – Apr 25, 27 sap days2720102010: Mar 2 – Mar 30, 36 sap days3620092009: Mar 20 – Apr 24, 40 sap days4020082008: Mar 31 – Apr 16, 23 sap days2320072007: Mar 22 – Apr 21, 34 sap days3420062006: Mar 14 – Apr 14, 31 sap days3120052005: Mar 19 – Apr 22, 41 sap days4120042004: Mar 23 – Apr 26, 33 sap days3320032003: Mar 24 – Apr 27, 26 sap days2620022002: Mar 28 – Apr 14, 36 sap days3620012001: Mar 25 – Apr 29, 35 sap days3520002000: Mar 17 – Apr 19, 41 sap days4119991999: Mar 18 – Apr 19, 41 sap days4119981998: Mar 11 – Apr 13, 33 sap days3319971997: Mar 27 – Apr 29, 30 sap days3019961996: Apr 2 – May 7, 43 sap days4319951995: Mar 21 – Apr 25, 36 sap days3619941994: Mar 26 – Apr 28, 37 sap days3719931993: Mar 23 – Apr 24, 26 sap days2619921992: Apr 2 – May 5, 31 sap days3119911991: Mar 18 – Apr 19, 33 sap days33
Each bar runs from the season's opening signal to its closing signal, estimated from daily Daymet temperatures at Maniwaki. Dashed lines mark the typical dates. The right column counts freeze-thaw sap days from December through May.

Maple production

La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau in the Census of Agriculture

Statistics Canada counts the farms that report maple taps in its Census of Agriculture every five years. In 2021 it counted 11 in La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau, with 104,300 taps; in 2016, 16 farms and 100,380 taps. Among Quebec's 61 census divisions with a published tap count, La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau ranks 49th, and 60th of the 94 in this atlas.

Over the five years the farm count changed −31% and taps +4%. Statistics Canada cautions that 2021 and 2016 are not strictly comparable: the census-farm definition changed in 2021, and farms were assigned to their main location more strictly.

Statistics Canada doesn't publish syrup volume by census division, so the Canadian pages show farms and taps, not gallons or litres.

La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau maple production, 2016 and 2021 (Statistics Canada, Census of Agriculture)
Census yearFarms reporting tapsTaps
202111104,300
201616100,380

A separate, newer source

PPAQ regional fact sheet, 2026

The Producteurs et productrices acéricoles du Québec (PPAQ) publish a fact sheet for each sugaring region, with figures for every MRC. These are from the 2026 Ouest-du-Québec sheet. They count enterprises registered under the joint marketing plan, by where the sugarbush is; the census above counts 2021 farms by their main location. The two sit side by side here and are never added together.

Enterprises
10
under the joint marketing plan
Taps
136,711
as printed
Annual production
574,186 lb
estimate, pounds of syrup
Value
$1.9 million
Canadian dollars

Taps by forest ownership

Private forest 33%Public forest 67%

  • Figures in millions are rounded to a tenth, as PPAQ printed them.
  • Annual production is PPAQ's estimate (Groupe AGÉCO's yield estimate applied to the taps), not a measured harvest. Ouest-du-Québec sheet (PDF, French)

Nearby

Neighboring maple divisions

Distances are between reference towns; typical dates are each division's own estimate.

About these numbers

The season dates are estimated from 35 seasons of daily high and low temperatures for the Daymet 1-km grid cell at Maniwaki, the division's most populous municipality in the 2021 Census; the cell sits at 171 m (561 ft). Each day is scored with the same freeze-thaw rule as our live forecast: a sap day is an overnight low under −1 °C (30.2 °F) followed by an afternoon high over +3 °C (37.4 °F). A season's closing signal is the last sap day before accumulated warmth reaches a threshold, and the opening signal sits 35 days before that, never earlier than the first real freeze-thaw week. The rule was calibrated on 117 state-seasons of USDA-reported dates in the US and is applied here unchanged. In Quebec it reproduces the pattern between regions in producers' reported seasons (Houle et al. 2015), and the typical dates are anchored to that record. Production figures are copied from Statistics Canada as published; the PPAQ figures, from its 2026 regional fact sheet, are shown separately. Full method, the Daymet checks and the Quebec validation → Run a sugarhouse here? Put this sap forecast on your own website →

Sources · 9

  1. 1.Maple taps, Census of Agriculture, 2021 (Table 32-10-0362-01) · Statistics Canada
  2. 2.Maple taps, Census of Agriculture, 2011 and 2016 (Table 32-10-0423-01) · Statistics Canada
  3. 3.Fiche région 2026 : Ouest-du-Québec · Producteurs et productrices acéricoles du Québec
  4. 4.Daymet: Daily Surface Weather Data on a 1-km Grid for North America, Version 4 R1 · ORNL DAAC
  5. 5.Impacts of climate change on the timing of the production season of maple syrup in eastern Canada (PLOS ONE 10(12): e0144844, 2015) · Houle et al.
  6. 6.Sap flow in sugar maple: timing and weather drivers (Frontiers in Agronomy, 2025) · de Lima Santos et al.
Show 3 more
  1. 7.2021 Census cartographic boundary files (census divisions, population centres) · Statistics Canada
  2. 8.Population and dwelling counts, 2021 Census (Tables 98-10-0002-01 and 98-10-0011-01) · Statistics Canada
  3. 9.GeoNames geographical database (CA) · GeoNames

Licences and attribution

  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Census of Agriculture 2021 and 2016 (Tables 32-10-0362-01 and 32-10-0423-01), 2021 Census population and dwelling counts (Tables 98-10-0002-01 and 98-10-0011-01) and 2021 Census cartographic boundary files. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada.
  • Thornton, M.M., R. Shrestha, Y. Wei, P.E. Thornton, S-C. Kao, and B.E. Wilson. 2022. Daymet: Daily Surface Weather Data on a 1-km Grid for North America, Version 4 R1. ORNL DAAC, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA. https://doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2129
  • Place coordinates: GeoNames (geonames.org), CC BY 4.0.
  • Québec MRC figures: Producteurs et productrices acéricoles du Québec, Fiches région 2026 (production estimates from Groupe AGÉCO).

FAQ

La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau sugaring questions

When should I tap maple trees in La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau, Quebec?
In a typical year the sap starts running around March 16 near Maniwaki and the season winds down around April 23. Have your taps in a day or two before the first forecast string of nights below −1 °C and days above +3 °C. In the past 35 seasons the weather signal came as early as Mar 2 and as late as Apr 2.
How much maple syrup does La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau produce?
Statistics Canada doesn't publish syrup volume by census division. Its 2021 Census of Agriculture counted 11 farms reporting 104,300 maple taps in La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau, number 49 of 61 Quebec divisions with a published count. Separately, the PPAQ's 2026 fact sheet for the Ouest-du-Québec region estimates annual production at 574,186 lb of syrup from 136,711 taps.
How many sap days does La Vallée-de-la-Gatineau get in a season?
On average 34.8 freeze-thaw sap days from December through May at Maniwaki, of which about 10.1 are textbook days with a night between about −7 and −2 °C and a day between 4 and 9 °C. The best season since 1991 was 2020 (57 sap days); the leanest was 2008 (23).
Where do these dates come from?
From 35 seasons of daily high and low temperatures at Maniwaki (Daymet 1-km grid), scored with the same freeze-thaw rule as our live forecast. In Quebec they are anchored to producers' reported season in the region (Houle et al. 2015, 1999–2011). They describe a typical year at one point in the division; your sugarbush, slope and elevation can shift them by days.

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