First-Year Sugarin' Post-Mortem

[new_n_ky]

Hey Folks,
I never got around to it, but a big 'Thank You' to all who helped with information in my making maple syrup for the first time. I consider the year a success, but now that the taps are pulled, I know that there are several things that I want to improve before next year. I would like for the group to comment on some things that I need to do differently. First, out of 50 taps, probably 20-25 produced no more than 2 quarts of sap the entire year. Most of the others would fill the container each day. Should I have drilled new holes for the non-producers? Second, my little 2' X 2' evaporator could hardly keep up with the 25-30 taps that were producing. I plan to add 50 taps for next year. If I have 100 producing taps and do not plan on expanding in the future, what size should my evaporater be if I plan on cooking twice weekly? Please keep in mind that I give away all of my syrup, so I need to keep my financial outlay to a minimum. I have bought a 180-gallon stainless steel milk tank for holding sap, so that would be a limiting factor also. (Please check the 'For Sale w/o Photo' section for a larger tank that I bought at the same time.) Third, even after several filterings, some sugar sand would still settle out in the bottom of the jars. Is this normal? Again, all help is greatly appreciated.
Sincerely, Gill Jessee[/u]

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Jesse,

Might want to look at a 2x4 or a 2x6. There are a lot of other hobby sizes out there like 18x60 and etc and any of these would work. Better to get a 2x6 as it would evaporate twice what a 2x4 would and with a 100 good running taps, you could easily get 600 to 800 gallon of sap in a good week.

As far as the trees, might just want to look for more trees?? Are you tapping all sugar maples or what kind of maples are you tapping?? Red maples won't run nearly as much as sugar maples, but they should run way more than two quarts??

[new_n_ky]

Brandon,
Practically all of my taps are sugar maples. Sometimes, two trees within 5 feet of each other would have the kind of variance that I spoke about in my original post. I was wondering if a tap isn't producing, should I move to a different location on the tree and retap? Also, does my price on the stainless steel tank seem to be in line with what they are bringing?
Thanks, Gill Jessee

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Gill,

Price seems fine on the tank. Glad it isn't closer as I might be interested but don't need it now. As far as the taps, the same trees may produce good next year. Hasn't been a good sap year down south. Next year when you tap, try tapping on the other side of the tree.

[brookledge]

Gill
If you are going to tap around 100 taps and only boil twice a week you are going to need alot more storage. 1 gallon per tap is the minimun and better to be at 1.5-2 gal per tap. So if you boil 2 times a week with 100 taps you should be looking at 400-500 gallons for storage otherwise you will need to boil more often.
As far as filtering are you using a filter for maple syrup? If you are somethings that will cause cloudyness are: Filter has a week spot in it, hold it up to the light to see if there is any spot that lets in light. Another thing is when the syrup is going through do not squeeze of scrape the filter. If yo do that it will force crap through.
Keith

[SteveD]

I will attest to JUST learning what Keith said....we have had so little sap so far this year that ...in order not to waste any precious syrup.....I squeezed the filter. We have very nice colored....cloudy.....syrup. :oops:

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

If you squeeze the filter, do it at the end of filtering and squeeze it into a bucket that you can filter at a later date. Filters hold a lot of syrup and a good idea to squeeze them, just filter the squeezed syrup later or keep for personal use as everything will eventually settle to the bottom! :D

[brookledge]

I was told that the felt filters should never be twisted. It will tear the fibers and weaken the filter and will start to let solids through even though it looks good. Maybe you can squeeze it a little without harm. When I used cone filters I would pick up the bottom and sort of fold it in half to get the last of the syrup through.
Keith

[maplehound]

When I was still using cone filters I would hang them over the evaporator to keep them moist. Then when I switched to a clean filter I would take the old one and fill it with hot sap from the evaporator and hang to drip back in. That way I saved all the sugar and still kept the sugar sand out. You can always rinse them out later or just change the prefilter for the next time you use it.
Ron

[DougM]

Gil,
we have 118 taps, and cook twice a week on a 2.5x8, with a hood but no pre-heater. (That's for next year)

With 100 taps you'll be about the same size as us, and I would agree with what Brookledge said about storage. That's definitely been the sticking point for us this year. In one two-day period we filled all 440 gallons of storage that we have, plus a couple of spare 55-gallon drums had about 40 gal. each in them.
(We're not that far away, and I'd LOVE to have that tank, but I'm not sure it's in the budget right now.) :)

Something else to keep in mind is filtering your sap BEFORE storage.
Previously we always filtered into the storage tank. This year we changed our storage system ease of emptying, so we were filtering later in the process and had darker syrup.
I don't know if that's the sole cause or not, but the Maple Syrup Producers Manual stresses filtering before storage, and that's something we didn't accomplish this year.