The Coldwater Maple Company Game

Level 1 · Buckets

1. Sap drips into each tap's 15 L bucket on thawing days. A full bucket overflows. You: tap the bucket.
2. A beaver carries it to the 120 L sap tank. If the tank is full, the beaver waits with the pail.
3. A float valve feeds the evaporator pans from the tank on its own. Watch the dashes run through the pipe.
4. The fire boils the sap, and the heat fades fast. You: tap the woodpile.
5. Syrup thickens in the syrup pan and the thermometer climbs. The ring around DRAW OFF fills as the batch cooks. You: tap DRAW OFF when it turns amber at 104 °C. The ring then drains toward 106 °C, where the batch scorches.

Level 2 · Tubing + RO

1. Sap runs down the laterals and mainlines into the 600 L sap tank on its own. You: splice chewed lines.
2. The RO pumps sap through its membranes and pulls out water: 2% sugar in, 6% out. The blue drain is the water leaving. You: tap the RO to wash it when it slows.
3. Concentrate collects in the 160 L 6% tank. If that fills, the RO stops and the sap tank backs up and overflows.
4. A float valve feeds the pans and the fire boils it. You: tap the woodpile.
5. Batches finish about three times as fast. You: tap DRAW OFF when it turns amber. Syrup runs through a felt filter into the jug, then gets bottled on the shelf.

Level 3 · Farm Stand

1. The sugar bush, lines and RO run just like Level 2, and every draw-off is bottled on the shelf in the sugar shack.
2. A farm stand sits off to the right of the shack. You: tap the bottles on the shelf. The next free beaver carries up to 3 bottles to the stand.
3. Every so often a car full of chickens zooms up to the stand. They buy one bottle, two bottles or none at all, at $20 a bottle, and then drive away.
4. If the stand is empty when they pull in, they leave without buying, so keep it stocked.
5. Your retail maple syrup sales are totalled at the end of the season, and in Level 3 your personal best is your total sales.