Southern Ohio

[dobbs4m16]

From the top of the hills that over look the Ohio River, we put out 150+ taps on buckets & bags last week . Collected approimately 200 gallons of sap today. Boiled a little over 100 gallons of it today, rendering about 2 1/2 gallons. Will try to finish the rest off tomorrow. Sure looks promising from here.:)

[newman_maple]

I was only able to put out 70 taps this year, but I brought in 140 gallons yesterday and have quite a bit in bags and buckets now. I prefer to leave it in the bags with the wind blowing like it is today.

It is good to hear from another local producer. I hope it turns out to be a great year. Hopefully, the weather cooperates....

[dobbs4m16]

Been gathering sap, and been busy boiling--but with the weather the way its going, can the season be coming to a close?:confused:

--and good to hear from a fellow maple syrup producer in southern Ohio

[brttnway]

Been gathering sap, and been busy boiling--but with the weather the way its going, can the season be coming to a close?:confused:

--and good to hear from a fellow maple syrup producer in southern Ohio
Newbie with 10taps in SW Ohio boiling in stockpot over open flame...gotta get a little more proficient. Anyway is gathering done for this year or if the weather reset to normal conditions will the sap running again?

[newman_maple]

If we get a good freeze in the next few days, things will be fine. It is questionable if that will happen this weekend or early next week. Let's hope for the best!

[Buckeye mapler]

Got the freeze we needed last night around wilmington area. supposed to be 51 today, but when. I guess it doesnt matter with the temp staying around 50 overnight. tomorrow may be the time to collect after this freeze. forecast shows a few more freezes this week too with warm days. should be a good week and enough to keep the buds off for a while longer!

[newman_maple]

The weather has not warmed up enough for a good run today. It was freezing last night, but not for long here. I hope to get enough sap to boil before the next freeze. We will definitely have a major run after the big freeze this week.

[Buckeye mapler]

yeah, I didnt feel no 51 degrees today! maybe they are wrong and it is going to freeze tonight! collected around 75 gallons tonight. they were barely dripping. well, by wednesday I expect another good load. That puts me at 240 so far. I saw that the last bit of snow was gone from the floor of the woods so that should indicate the ground is next!

[MFarmall]

Buckeye, sure didn't hit a HIGH of 40 today here. Was still getting sleet and snow flakes late this afternoon. Got 60 gallon today, warming up now and sak on tree in the yard really dripping good at 9:30 this evening. So looks like with warmer temps now be some sap tomorrow.
Even with warm temps last week got 170 gallon of sap the 17th. Sugar was only 1.6%, did get a little over 3.5 gallon of syrup made.
Looks like still have another couple weeks if weatherman keeps getting it right. Of course, give it an hour and the Ohio weather will change.
Mel

[buckeye gold]

Sap started running good for me last Monday. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were good collection days for me. My best day was 75+ gallons of sap and most were around 50 off 58 taps. Things shut down Friday. I made a little over 4 gallons of syrup Tuesday - Friday. Pretty much kept my little half pint humping. Had just a little run last night and this morning, but the sugar content was good at 2.8% so I boiled it and made a half gallon of syrup. I checked this evening and there isn't enough to collect tomorrow, unless it does something wild tonight. I too think that things will run later this week.

Keep the fires hot and the sap flowing

[Buckeye mapler]

I have a feeling we may be hauling in some sap in the next few days. I like seeing those freezing nights that are in the forecast, the problem is as Mel mentioned, you go back an hour later and look at the forecast and it is different. I try to plan my days to collect according to the temps as I am sure you all do as well. How can I do that with the forecast constantly changing????:mad:

[newman_maple]

The temperature was almost right Saturday night. My 70 taps yielded only 40 gallons yesterday and today, but my niece's collected 80 gallons from 30 taps. It is always a couple degrees colder there at night. I am up to 600 gallons collected. My sap test showed 2.2% today, but with filtering, etc.. we have about 42:1. I hope we get a big freeze this week!

[MFarmall]

Temps here have been below freezing since Monday night till this afternoon. Got 50 gallon of sap Sunday and 150 gallon Monday, sugar was down to 1.8% last week but back up to 2-2.2% Monday. Test sak was starting to drip pretty good around 4:30 this afternoon, went back to check lines and water in the woods was starting to freeze up so at least a little more time for the trees to get chilled a little more. Just barely starting to run so looks like tomorrow and Friday should be pretty good. Hopefully still get another week of decent temps, of course welcome to Ohio weather. If not at least have a real good start on wood for next year.
Mel

[Buckeye mapler]

going to check the buckets today and see what it did yesturday. I hope to get some sap in the tank today so i can start boiling again!

[newman_maple]

We should have a great weekend (in the mud). I have brought in about 230 gallons in the past 2 days and we are looking at a very cold night and warm Saturday. We should have a big weekend!!!

[buckeye gold]

I had a good run Monday and a big run Wednesday Night. I missed thursdays run, because I was out of town and I dumped today because of so much rain contamination. But it ran some today. The end of last week was really good for me too. I'm in Ross County.

[Buckeye mapler]

collected over 200 gallons tonight. they were running like a leaky fawcet too! awesome. should be good this weekend! thats close to 300 for the week despite some less than perfect conditions!

[buckeye gold]

Since I was one of the early tappers (January 28th)I have saw my runs dwindle over the last 3 days and today some trees just plain dried up. However, since I have 183 trees I've never tapped, I pulled taps and reset them in new trees. All the new taps were dripping soon as I set the tap...good times return! I been averaging 1-1.5 gallons of syrup a day on the half pint, which is busy enough for me. Been a good season so far, I've already doubled last year.

[newman_maple]

Some of my taps have stopped, but the cold weather has given me another run from most of the trees. My 100 taps have given me close to 1600 gallons of sap so far. The last few gallons have been dark, but I prefer to have some dark and grade B to mix with the light since I have very few who want light syrup. That is a shame since it is so popular in places.

[buckeye gold]

I'm going to hold out until this weekend then pull all my taps. Things are in need of another cleaning and this close I'm just gonna try and get a couple days more and quit. It's about there anyway. I've had a good season, I've made 15.5 gallons of syrup and about 20% of it light amber, 10-15% medium amber and the rest Dark Amber on a half Pint. If I can get one or two more runs before Sunday I should end up between 17-18 gallons. I'm happy with that. Then my favorite part(not)...wash and scrub and store.....aaarrrrrgggg!