Rolly Gagne in at the St. Pierre museumWith daily temperatures consistently climbing above the melting point here in the Southeast, the maple harvest is right around the corner.

Rolly Gagne is the President of the St. Pierre Museum. He says if you begin harvesting maple water you early, you can split the bark and damage the tree. He notes it is still a bit too early to start tapping trees.

"Our target is for next weekend that it should start flowing. We can see that there is a little bit of flow now but nothing like it should be because again it is just to cold. The sun is definitely a big factor so we are probably going to start harvesting this weekend and on."

Gagne says the maple harvest is hit and miss and it is hard to predict how it is going to go this year. He adds they hope to have a strong harvest this year so that they can have fresh maple syrup at their Sugaring Off Festival on the first weekend of April.

"I am hoping it will be strong but if it is like last year, remember last year we only a couple of days and then we lost the temperature drops so it is hard to tell. Mother Nature, she plays her own fiddle so we need to play along as much as we can. We are hoping we are able to get a harvest this year because last year we didn't really."