Space Still Available for Wildwood Ranch Open House Tours

Originally published February 27th, 2024

Updated 10:39 a.m. March 11th, 2024

(KNSI) — Space is still available for tours of Wildwood Ranch in St. Joseph.

There will be open houses at Kraemer Lake-Wildwood County Park on Sunday, March 17th, and the 24th. Employee Shelly Carlson says the roughly hour-long tour includes a walkthrough of the woods to take in the hundreds of maple trees the ranch taps to get syrup. It also shows the traditional and modern ways of collecting sap with buckets and pipelines and how contents are transferred to the sugar shack, which is a fan-favorite leg of the tour.

“Everyone loves to see the evaporator going. That’s always kind of an exciting time when we’re cooking. See the steam come out of the stack. You can stand below it, if the wind is just right, it’ll kind of blow on down on top of you. You can get that sweet smell.”

In the sugar house, a demonstration will show how processing equipment like reverse osmosis machines and evaporators are used to convert sap from the trees into syrup.

Since the facility is located on park property, registration is required with Stearns County to be a part of the tour. A link is here. Mud-appropriate footwear is recommended in the forest.

Tours run on the hour from noon to 4:00 p.m. and you can get a taste of what they’re cooking up this year.

“Everyone really likes to taste the maple sugar and the maple syrup. We give out samples, that’s always a highlight.”

Last year, the ranch won “Best of Show” at the State Fair. They also grabbed the award in 2018. Carlson says this year’s syrup is light and tastes like cream soda.

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