Dark syrup

[GCunningham]

Hello again everybody second year newbie here with another question I am sure has been asked many times.
I am on my fourth small batch of the year and have had the same results on all 4 tries.They were all very dark! I mean off the scale dark! I tapped early (2/12/12), but the first batch on 2/16/12 was dark to start with which leads me to believe that it wasn't too early.The longest I stored the sap was 5 days in a tank out in the cold.I am using the same process I used last year when got light and dark amber.What am I missing?

[stoweski]

Let me know when you find what you're missing!

I've only made a couple gallons of syrup (but have over 300 gal of sap either partially boiled or sitting in the tank since last night) and have made dark syrup. Last night I was boiling and at 10pm I hadn't drawn off anything... even though it was at 220 for a couple hours.
I'm afraid that the stuff I'll be drawing off this afternoon will be black or close to it!

I was actually hoping that with fresh sap I'd get a changeover to at least medium to satisfy those customers.

I realize I shouldn't complain... I prefer dark over light!

[johnc]

like you i tapped early had 1 smallbatch of light then went to medium w/2 day storage then to darker than average dark. in a glass bottle held to sun light it looks good & tastes great, what i plan on trying is to put a few more taps out & see what mother nature is going to give us

[Bobby]

I too seem to have the same results this year. Made some real nice medium real sweet and the next time I had enough sap to boil it went straight to a dark amber. I have made 8 gallons for the year thus far. I am only using a flat pan and noticed quite a lot of sugar sand buildup on the bottom of the pan. Cleaned it thouroughly and am waiting for the weather to cooperate to get some more sap to see what that will bring. Last year I noticed that a thourough cleaning of the pan yeilded better looking and grades of syrup. Will just have to wait and see, but I will check back and let you know how that worked for me. The only other option I can think of is RO, but I cant afford that, maybe next yea

[stoweski]

A ton of sugar sand this year! I've been using three pre-filters and a synthetic filter after drawing off.
I started drawing off some syrup and filtering it, then dumping it back in just to see if by cleaning it out periodically I could keep it from darkening up. No luck so far.

Cleaning everything today as I have about 25 gallons of 'sweet' and just collected 125 gallons of sap last night. Hoping that keeping it clean will change my luck.

[Russell Lampron]

I too have been making dark syrup so far this season. The sap runs haven't been consistent enough yet to boil on a regular basis and keep things fresh. I'm not complaining though. Most of my customers like the darker grades anyway.