The following article appeared on the Linns Stamp News website. It is reproduced here with the permission of the author. It is great to see Canada Post honor maple syrup making traditions across Canada with these great new stamps featuring the iconic Québec round syrup can.

 

Canada Post celebrates Quebec’s sweet spring tradition

By David Hartwig

Canada Post issued two stamps March 19 to recognize the sugar shacks where sap is boiled to produce maple syrup.

“The vibrant sights, sounds and scents of the sugaring-off season come to life at sugar shacks across Quebec around springtime,” Canada Post said. “Traditions surrounding the temps des sucres are such an integral part of Quebecois culture and identity, they have been designated part of the province’s intangible heritage.”

The permanent-rate (currently $1.24) stamps are issued as se-tenant (side-by-side) pairs in a booklet of six. Perforated at the sides with curved tops and bottoms, the stamps take on the forms of maple syrup cans, mirroring the traditions of sugar shacks.

Illustrations on the label area of the cans show both an outdoor and indoor scene. “Inspired by popular, commercial and advertising art from the 1940s and 1950s, the illustrations evoke colourful scenes of people enjoying shared meals and time outside,” Canada Post said.

Each spring, sap collected from sugar maple trees is brought to sugar shacks to be boiled down into syrup, a process that defines the sugaring-off season in Quebec, where more than 90 percent of Canada’s maple syrup is produced.

While today’s traditions associated with sugar shacks date back almost two centuries, Canada Post explained how maple syrup predates European settlement, with Indigenous peoples producing it and sharing their knowledge with early French colonists.

Paprika designed the Sugar Shack stamps and the FDC using artwork from French illustrator Gerard DuBois, who began his graphic design career in Canada and now lives and works in Montreal. DuBois’ work has appeared in many major magazines in North America and Europe.

Canada Post previously showcased DuBois’ art in a 2018 Illustration set with a stamp featuring his piece It’s Not a Stream of Consciousness (Scott 3092d, 3097). DuBois also illustrated three of Canada Post’s Christmas stamps in 2015 (279a-c, 281-283).

Canada Post occasionally issues stamps in nontraditional formats, such as the 2022 circular Carousel Animals miniature sheet (Scott 3343), but stamps shaped like objects are less common.

A 2017 stamp is shaped like a hockey puck (Scott 3043) and two circular stamps feature dimples resembling a golf ball in a 2004 issue marking a century of the Canadian Open Golf Championship (2051-2052).

The stamps were printed in 130,000 booklets of six. The Canada Post ordering number is 414314111.

An official first-day cover is franked with both stamps and canceled in Saint-Georges, Quebec, home of the annual Festival Beauceron de l’Érable (Beauce Maple Festival). Canada Post produced 6,000 FDCs with the ordering number 414314131.

At the time of publication, customers in the United States cannot purchase these or other products from Canada Post due to U.S. Customs changes.

For those outside the United States, Canada Post stamps and related items are available from Canada Post at www.canadapost.ca/shop, and by mail order from Canada Post Customer Service, Box 90022, 2701 Riverside Drive, Ottawa, ON K1V 1J8 Canada; or by telephone from Canada at 800-565-4362, and from other countries at 902-863-6550.