400 taps in

[northwoods_forestry]

and 300 to go. That nice run shaping up yesterday morning was spoiled by the clouds and south wind coming in at midday. Still enough sap to boil for a couple of hours last night though still waiting to draw off the first syrup.

Starting work on installing 50 new tubing taps today and may get aroud to tapping the north sugarbush.

[Daren]

Got 300 in yesterday myself, but vacuum pump has not been moved into place yet so not much collected from those efforts. You are spot on with the promise of the first half of the tapping day, but then it seemed to dry right up. Even though no draw yet....it must have been starting to smell pretty good!

[PARKER MAPLE]

Hey northwoods, I think today your going to be flooded with sap, providing the wind stays calm. Im stuck with the ones iv got tapped for now, but tomorrow should be setting up the londonderry sugarbush and tapping them(250). Then buckets first of the month. I expect I will be gathering this afternoon. maybe boiling that in tonite. Its should be quite for a few days after today i think.

[northwoods_forestry]

Made a wee bit of syrup tonight on the 75 gallons I gathered. Not much of a run today. didn't get cold enough last night. I agree, should be quiet for the weekend.

[northwoods_forestry]

Forgot to add that I wasn't getting much sap on tubing, but some of the buckets on my better trees were close to overflowing!

I would think the last 2 days were pretty good for the vacuum folks, not so good for gravity...

[Starting Small]

Northwoods, why does there seem to be a difference between buckets and tubing. I am noticing the same thing.

[northwoods_forestry]

Wish I could give a definative answer on gravity tubing vs. buckets. All I know is that new tubing will outperform buckets for the first year or two, but after that buckets will do better. It has to do with the contamination of the tubing with bacteria and occurs despite the best efforts at cleaning the tubing system at season's end.

Had a solid run yesterday and boiled well into the night. Found a couple of new leaks in the evaporator last night. Pans are good, the leaks are all in the plumbing. Need to take care of those today. I also broke off the rail that holds the float arm on one side of the syrup pan when I went to reverse flow - I am not happy about that!

Still running at only 2/3 capacity. Wish I was able to get the other pipeline up and running, but I'm single parenting this weekend and it's all I can do to gather and boil - no time for more tapping!

[northwoods_forestry]

500 + taps in. All the existing tubing is tapped and about 1/2 the buckets hung. I'll hang the rest of the buckets this morning and then try to finish setting up and tapping the new pipeline.

Hoping for a big day today.

[PARKER MAPLE]

Good run coming today and tomorrow Northwoods. I tapped some trees on the edge of a feild yesterday. I dont think they have ever been tapped before. Man they ran extreamly good. I need more buckets lol. Good luck keep us posted

[northwoods_forestry]

Yesterday sure was a bust! LOL - Ran around all morning in that glorious sunshine putting up the last of the buckets. No sooner had the sap started to trickle than the sun went behind the clouds, a brisk south wind blew in, and the temperature stuck at 34 degrees all day.

My laterals never even thawed!

So is today the day?

[PARKER MAPLE]

same here Northwoods, busted here. got the rest of my lines hung and tapped. And put up the rest of my buckets. stopping at 680 taps today. still have about 300 more to go if I find the time.It ran all day, drill bits where steaming as they went into the tree. seamed to be running well when I left there also. so tomorrow I will run up there and check all the lines and gather whats in the tanks. I did boil for the first time this year today. fingers are crossed, for a good run over night.

MR

[northwoods_forestry]

Hey Rookie, I'm betting your efforts paid off yesterday. Not a gusher, to be sure, but a respectable run for February!

We pulled in over 250 gallons of sap and made another 5 gallons of A Med.

[northwoods_forestry]

All the taps are in, 650 this year up from 600 last year. A bit short of the 700 I was planning on, but I went with fewer buckets this time.

Another year without Fancy. We've made 5 gallons of A Med and 10 of A Dark so far. Sugar content is in the mid 2% range, better than last year.

[PARKER MAPLE]

Northwoods, I havent either made any fancy this year. Cant wait to see what this snow is going to do for us. Old imers are saying this could be a long season, the snow could prolong it from what I understand. I had a little over 300 gals the other day in the gathering tank and boiled for a few hours making some med to light amber. have to go to bascoms this saturday and get some more barrels. I all done tapping this year just getting a little over whelmed with trying to get everything all together. Im at 760+/- or so. Looking forward to another good run friday and saturday.

MR

[northwoods_forestry]

760 taps!! I think it's time to change your alias from Maple Rookie to Maple Man!

Late February Leap Year Maple Sap Sneek Attack! Anyone else get slammed with sap on 2/28? Had the sugarhouse steaming till the wee hours last night!

[Walling's Maple Syrup]

760 taps!! I think it's time to change your alias from Maple Rookie to Maple Man!

Late February Leap Year Maple Sap Sneek Attack! Anyone else get slammed with sap on 2/28? Had the sugarhouse steaming till the wee hours last night! We are located in upstate ny. Only 34 degrees yesterday and sap ran like cazy! Ran 4100 gallons in 4 hours yesterday afternoon. Never would have guessed it.

[PARKER MAPLE]

Northwoods,
my only complaint with new sugarbush is the elevation, its like 2200 ft and always 15degs colder there then here. Its been a learning curve this year hopefully trying to make enough money to buy an ro for next year, so the tap count will expand to the max on that bush( theres probably around 1500). trying to make sugaring a winter income for next year so had to jump in and get my feet wet somewhere..

MR

[Randy Brutkoski]

I have made 440 gallons of syrup so far and most of it is fancy, I am way ahead of schedule, unlike last year.

[PARKER MAPLE]

awesome Randy sounds like your having a great year so far

[PARKER MAPLE]

Have you ever cleaned the soot off the bottom of your front pan? Well I was in the sugarhouse today and missing around, checking out my grates and fire bricks, and looked at the underside of the front pan, wow looked like I was burning tires or something in there lol. So wasting time i decided to take pan off and wash it off. It was really bad, hopefully it will make a difference in how it finishes off syrup. Maybe I will do the flue pan after the spring. All my woods roads are opened up and check all the buckets, were good for tomorrow and saturdays run.

MR

[northwoods_forestry]

I give the bottom of the pan a scrub with a wire brush every now and again, usually in place.

Should be a good run coming up, though it may be slow in coming. Looks to be pretty cold tonight.

[PARKER MAPLE]

Well this weekends run was kind of a bust for me. 760 taps +/- and gathered 150 gallons all weekend, kept waiting for it to run good but just dribbled in. so finally gathered and boiled this afternoon. Anyways im all cleaned up for tuesday and rest of next week. Looking very good keeping fingures crossed...I think this 14in of snow really slowed things down for a day or two nows its going to pick back up again. we will see

MR

[northwoods_forestry]

Put through the last couple of hundred gallons of sap today and finished up with the only B syrup of the season. We reached 75% of our production goals, not bad considering how wacky the weather was.

Starting the big scrub tomorrow and putting our rig up for sale. Looking to upgrade to a 3x10 next season!