Erie County is home to sugar maple trees and Asbury Woods has a program to help people make their own syrup at home.

Lisa Gauker held up a bottle of store-bought pancake syrup. “Is this really maple syrup?” the recreation and special events supervisor for the Berks County Department of Parks and Recreation asked.

From late November to early March, Ella Smoot can usually be found in one of two places: the forest or the sugar shack. Like all maple syrup producers, her winter is a rush of running sap—cold ...