metal tap sanitizing

[Kev]

is there any value in pulling taps mid season and sanitizing? or is it a case of anything that is in/on the spile in the hole?
The reason I am asking is this year a friend tapped a few trees in his yard very late about 1 1/2 weeks before I pulled everything that was about 1 1/2 weeks after I put in my last. he had to leave town for a few days and gave me some of his sap to add to my last cook. (only about 3 gal) when i was done boiling I had realized I had not fed one of the gallons into the pan.
my sap was not lasting very long at all, getting cloudy very quickly by that point in the season. just on a whim I left that gallon in the milk jug on my garage floor for over a week and it was still clear. everything I was collecting by then would not have lasted 1/4 that time (i am guessing there) but it would not have lasted a week crystal clear!
I tried to do a search on this subject and had no luck

[markct]

i think it has to do more with the cleanliness of containers the sap is in, ie tanks or buckets. i had a simular surprise in that my neighbor taps a dozen trees with his kids and makes a little syrup, usualy just boils one or two days. he had a 55 gallon drum with 3 taps and short lines running from a tree next to it, about 3/4 full that hadnt been emptied since the beggining of the season, his other closer taps flowed more than they needed. he said i could pump it out and take it, i said it surely was spoiled but i would look at it. at this point in the season, about 4 weeks, my sap was getting cloudy in a day and a half or less. but when i opened and looked the sap was perfectly clear and just fine! pumped it and boiled it no problems! i have to think that maybe the fact that barrel had only one "batch" of sap is the difference, whereas by 4 weeks in my tanks and lines all had thousands of gallons thru them

[Kev]

Your reasoning could very well be correct,
although I did resanitize buckets after a warm spell 3/4 of the way through the season. but then my buckets are open in a way, sure I have lids on them but they are arched for rain to run off and so wind born stuff can blow in.
I am bound and determined to at least run some on gravity tubes next season
it will be interesting to see the comparision by the end of the season, as far as cloudy sap
my friend had used tubing to milk jugs on the ground (similar situation to what you discribe)
I was looking around today at some property a guy said I could tap. There are at least fifty maples on it that are of tappable size :)
I can not handle them in conjunction with what I am running now. so I will have to RO to do it.
I am insane, I just know it.... why in Gods name would a guy that can not sell his syrup, feel this undeniable compulsion to tap even more!!!!