Wanish Sugar Bush schedules open house for March 23
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By LeAnn R. Ralph
COLFAX — Have you ever wondered how maple syrup is made in a commercial operation?
If so — now is your chance to find out.
Wanish Sugar Bush will be holding an open house on Saturday, March 23, from 9 a.m. to 12 noon.
You can watch maple sap turn into maple syrup and see a 12-post reverse osmosis and a 4-foot by 16-foot LP-fired evaporator at work.
The open house will include tours of the processing facility, a kids’ coloring contest, prizes, pancakes and coffee, maple treats, and according to the announcement of the open house, “answers to your most pressing maple questions.”
Will Wanish started Wanish Sugar Bush five years ago while he was still in high school.
According to the Wanish Sugar Bush website, his interest in maple syrup started in 2018 when he began tapping maple trees and making maple syrup with his uncle.
When he was a junior at Colfax High School in 2021, Will obtained a $30,000 micro loan from a local regional business fund to build a syrup production facility, according to news stories on KARE 11 and the Chippewa County Economic Development Corporation websites.
Will currently has 5,000 “taps” and purchases thousands of gallons of maple sap from other local producers, the Wanish Sugar Bush website states.
Wanish had several thousand taps in the 2021 maple syrup season and hopes to have about 20,0000 taps in 15 years, according to the KARE 11 news story.
Will even has a dog named Maple, a yellow Labrador retriever born in May of 2021, who is Will’s companion and “helps” him out in the woods tapping maple trees.
During the KARE 11 news story, Will’s dad, Todd Wanish, and his grandfather, “Fuzzy” Rothbauer, noted that they were the “unpaid interns” at Wanish Sugar Bush. Will’s mom, Heather, has devoted her time and talent to promoting and marketing the Wanish Sugar Bush products.
The Colfax Messenger has attempted to set up interviews with young Mr. Wanish on several occasions over the past few years, but during maple syrup season, there’s no time to spare. Will is on the go all day long, checking taps, collecting sap and working on making maple syrup, sometimes until 3 or 4 a.m.
In addition to a variety of maple syrup, Wanish Sugar Bush offers holiday gift packages, maple candy, maple sugar and maple sugar in shaker bottles.
Wanish Sugar Bush is located at 9411 40th Street, Colfax — near the Albertville Tavern.
