Roots, Resilience, and Maple: The Story of Baird Farm

April 8, 2026·20 min·2 clips

Jacob Pausner explains how his fourth-generation Vermont farm now 'milks the trees' instead of cows to pay the bills.

Host Doug Stephan interviews Jacob Pausner, who manages Baird Farm with his wife Jenna Baird in North Chittenden, Vermont, a fourth-generation 585-acre family farm in Rutland County. Pausner describes the farm's transition from dairy to maple syrup production, explaining that dairy no longer pays the bills for small operations. The farm now taps approximately 15,000 trees. Vermont's maple industry produced over three million gallons of syrup in 2025, making up 53% of all US maple syrup output across approximately 3,000 sugar makers in 252 villages. Operations range from a neighbor tapping 40 trees with buckets to the largest operation in the state tapping over half a million trees. Pausner explains that the romantic image of maple farming — man in red plaid, rusty bucket, horse — has been replaced by what he calls outdoor plumbing: 115 miles of blue tubing connecting 10,000 fittings across Baird Farm's woodlands, draining sap downhill to collection points. The industry has quintupled in size over 20 years, a pace he compares to TikTok or Uber. Trees are tapped annually by drilling a fresh hole into the xylem, but the trees heal through a natural process called compartmentalization. Modern practices use smaller spouts and shallower depths to allow trees to grow faster than the rate of wounding. Baird Farm taps the same trees that great-grandmother Sarah Baird tapped in 1918, demonstrating the model's long-term sustainability. Raw maple sap is 98 to 98.5% water, containing only 1.5% sugar, requiring approximately 50 gallons of sap to produce one gallon of syrup. Pausner describes a large run from the previous night that yielded 40,000 gallons of sap and 640 gallons of finished syrup. Two key innovations drove the industry's growth: adding vacuum pressure to tubing, which can double or triple sap volume, and reverse osmosis machines that remove up to 90% of water from sap before boiling, dramatically reducing boiling time. The farm operates year-round, with woods maintenance beginning in late fall, tapping starting in January, and boiling running through sugaring season. Baird Farm offers free agritourism tours year-round, walking visitors out to working trees, demonstrating tapping, and explaining the full process. The farm sells a wide range of maple products including maple-stuffed mushrooms and popcorn.

As heard by us

Maple sugaring here comes through as work, restraint, and business all at once.

This episode treats maple sugaring as real work, not folklore. Jacob Pouser of Baird Farm walks through the winter to spring rhythm in North Chittenden, Vermont: cleaning up tubing, drilling new tap holes, and setting spiles. The most useful detail is the discipline behind it.

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Why you'd press play

Maple tapping, tree healing, and why Vermont sugaring starts in January, long before spring feels ready.

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