Are my holes going to dry out?

[maple6275]

2nd year novice here in central Maine. Tapped a little too early, maybe, last weekend. Nothing to speak of in the buckets after 5 days. Hopefully it'll warm up soon, but if not, when should I start to worry about my taps drying out?

Wishing everyone a better season than last!

[TF Maple]

Generally it takes 5 to 6 weeks for them to shut off.

[Ausable]

2nd year novice here in central Maine. Tapped a little too early, maybe, last weekend. Nothing to speak of in the buckets after 5 days. Hopefully it'll warm up soon, but if not, when should I start to worry about my taps drying out?

Wishing everyone a better season than last!

Howdy -- You are not alone -- I did the same thing -- But -- we should be ok --- good luck -- Mike

[abbott]

The holes will dry out eventually, but the research has shown that the tree doesn't do much healing until the temperature warms and bacteria begins to grow. If you're worried about it, put out a few more taps to compensate ;-)

[robbo]

I did the same thing on Monday in an effort to be able to tap with one of my sons to enjoy the activity together, but the I just have frozen sapsicles hanging from my taps. Saturday's 40's should help.

[Revi]

We tapped last week, and have gotten very little. We are going to start collecting for real this weekend. I think we might just have a season yet. We'll see...

[Notch Woodwork]

I found this article from UVM to be helpful:

www.uvm.edu/~pmrc/tapping.pdf

[Revi]

We tapped around the 25th of February, and not much has happened yet. This week may be the real beginning. Jeremy Steeves at Strawbery Hill Farms has already made some syrup. They have a lot of trees and usually tap in January in order to get them all done. Their tap holes don't dry up until the end of the season in April, so I think we're okay.

[Haynes Forest Products]

YES.....I was thinking about all the early tappers out there. Every year I wait to go back to Wisconsin and tap my trees. When I get there guys I know in the area say we started 2 weeks ago and had a few good runs. YIPPY %$&^%*&^SKIPPY. A FEW GOOD RUNS followed by 2 weeks of bacteria build up and sap production slowing down. I show up tap all the trees in a few days and out produce them with new clean taps. End of the season production shows I did better not tapping to early. SO get the jump on every one and get bragging rights. NOW would vacuum with the CV adapters make a difference I think so That will be next year if I dint burn my pans:o