North Central Wisconsin

[southfork]

Holding out another week in Rhinelander. With buckets and no freezing temps forecasted in the next several days concerned about tap holes drying later in season. With the deep snow should make for interesting mud if the forecast is anywhere near correct. Will tap sooner if forecast changes.

[Got It Bad]

Tapped today slow drips,can't wait, going to take what I get and boil it down right away should run through the night when it gets warm. Walking through the woods with snowshoes was hard still broke down half way tough going. With this much snow ground air temp should keep things cool.

[jgotz]

Well all tapped in and hoping to see filling buckets. they are slowly dripping but not gang busters as i was hoping for, but for early march and in northern wisconsin I guess we will have to take what we can get. This is my 2nd year sapping on my own, so everyday is a learning one.

[NJG]

Any Snow left in the woods up there? Tapped in last weekend near Prentice. None of the woods trees seemed to be running yet. Was hoping that all that hard packed snow in the woods would help carry things through the week until I get back up there this weekend. But, looking at the forcast, I can hardly imagine any snow left much less any trees running.

[Rhino]

Went to our woods this morning in southeast Price county and had to check on my vac pump/motor. Our buddy who is a county worker called and said a culvert blocked with ice and the water was very high by our tank/pump. Even though i didn't tap i did have everything ready to rock. He did get the blockage undone and the water was very close to flooding my motor/and pump. As far as the snow in the woods, our north hill is 90% covered with around 5 inches of snow, our south hill is patchy, all away from the trees and then some. This was at 8:30 in the morning so by now it's worse. Stopped at a neighbor 1 mile down the road that is on buckets and at 8:30 ish taps were only a drip 5 to 6 seconds. (yawn). Totally accepting the fact that this might be the first in 24 years that we don't tap. Looks like back to cutting trees to take up the time between now and putting in docks and boat lifts. Another neighbor close to our woods, who is holding off tapping, who also is a full time dairy farmer said it best this morning when he said," I wouldn't go cut a bunch of hay down if the forecast was for 7 more days of rain........nuff said.

[camp3sugarshack]

Not much happening in the northwoods I am thinking about pulling the taps.

[Ahnohta2]

Tapped in Moquah, Wi today, usually do not tap until the 20th of March. Only trees that dripped were ones shaded by Balsam Firs. Tapped on North side of trees this year hoping for tree to not be heated as much by sun on N side w/ all this warm weather. Forecast tonite is low of 35` after midnite, but right now at 8 PM it is 33` and dropping. Will get up at 5 am tomorrow and put in more taps. Sure is a screwy year for M S

[driske]

Hey Rhino,
We're trying not to be pessimistic, but the facts are..... this is bleak. The end of season harbingers are here. Wood cock are doing their mating ritual, robins and killdeer all about. If we make it through this weekend of warm rain without hearing spring peepers it will be a miracle. It didn't look too bad in the woods as far as bud development, but I made the mistake of driving to Athens for parts today, and OMG, are the woods getting red.
Productionwise we are at maybe 15% of our normal yield.
It's long been said" behind every successful farmer stands a wife with a good job in town" I sure hope she's up for picking up the slack this time around.

[mike z]

Here, just north of Ladysmith, the sap has been running, but very slow. Tapped last weekend and collected 250 g. off 200 taps so far. (buckets) Should get another 100 g. tomorrow. The syrup is light. So far, the sap has been clear, no sign yet of "the scungies" but with 70s on the way, they're not far off. A year for learning, I guess.

[Rhino]

Doug, Nice idea about the wives takeing up the financial slack with such a poor year, I will discuss that with mine later today. As i posted a few times we never tapped so theres alot of slack to pull tight. Each day looking at the extended forecast it just never ends. I'm sick of hearing the words "RECORD HIGHS". Up here the buds still look tight on the hard maples, the low/river maples have the fuzzy red look to them. Yesterday I ran to the woods that we logged in this winter and went to the bag tap that i tapped in early February during a warm spell, havn't looked at it since around late Feb. There was only a Gal. of sap in it for all those days! (big tree/in the open). Wasn't the best year to purchase a r.o but thats farming. I heard this morning that the jet stream ridge will finally move over us mid next week, bringing 2 to 3 days of rain, so even if it turns cold on the backside, what quality will the sap be especially with our mixture of soft maples? Hope you can force some more sap out before the frogs are singing the blues.

[camp3sugarshack]

Record highs all weekend! Pulling taps on Sat. or Sun. Look at all the fire wood we saved.

[Ahnohta2]

We reached 26` last nite in Moquah area. Went and tapped more trees early am today Some are running real good, most running tp poor side. Staying w/ tapping north side of trees only this year vs multiside.

[TerryF]

22 degrees in Goodman this morning so put out another 40 taps for a total 80. Had a little run on Wed as it was 26 degrees then. Running really good now and may hit the freezing mark again tonite. Hang in there guys it may happen good in NE Wis.

[mike z]

I'm leaving my taps in for awhile. Sit back and just see how this plays out.

[Ahnohta2]

gathered in 20 gal sap this afternoon. hopefully it will still run some tonite before shutting down till below 32` comes back

[TerryF]

35 degrees this AM and finished off 40 miserable little gallons from yesterday then collected a measly 25 gallons that ran today. It was 76 degrees here. What the H is going on....????? This ain't supposed to happen.

[Rhino]

Very interesting......Accuweather for Tomahawk has freezeing nights comeing up around next weekend and beyond, Intellicast has a cool down also, but not as cold, but our bush is in a low area where it usually is always much colder. Might be ramming the taps in yet, and with fresh holes it might be possable to hope for 5 days of 4000 gallons each day. Might be commercial but we still would be all smiles. Fat lady sit back down, the stage ain't ready yet.....Fingers crossed.

[driske]

Just checked the woods and there is some sap moving in the lines. Yesterdays boil produced syrup that flitered hard and had a little bite to it (bitter).
Strange smells from the steam, and the real bad news. The spring peepers are back.
We hit 80F yesterday and with another one of those on tap, things are hitting the wall.
This is the poorest season in my 32 years of sugaring.

[Rhino]

Thanks Doug for the slap in the face to get me back to the reality of it all. Wife and i decided to go out to the sugar shack and do some rideing on the 4-wheelers. Stepped out of the truck, and there it was....sound of peepers. rideing around the woods and looking up at the soft maples didn't do my optimism any good either. Stopped by a small producer on the way home and that was all doom and gloom to. He hoped to end with enough for the family but there won't be any for him to sell. Bag/bucket taps just didn't do it this season. Taps were wet but not enough to produce drops out the spiles. Yesterday we went ice fishing up to Minocqua, and had 8 inches of ice, but the other fishermen who fished the day before said there was 12 inches at that time! Everything is on the fast track for a sudden stop this year, or as Doug said "hitting the wall". I guess hind sight we did do the right thing by skipping the 2012 season but it sure is hard to accept it. Plan on putting stuff away that was ready to go for the season and wrap the evaporator so mice/bugs can't get into it. next spring just rinse it real good. Bags are ready to go for 2013, along with the wood and the list goes on. Only bright spot about this all i guess.

[driske]

Hey Rhino,
Bryan stopped by at Whitney's this AM. We we're watching him boil on that cute little 3x12 Hurricane Force 5. The commiseration concluded that none of us had seen a poorer season in our combined experience. Bryan's production per tap was significantly higher than my .1/gallon/tap. I would credit that to higher vacuum ,25" vs.my feeble 21". Also it sounds like the Newood flirted with freezing temps a night or 2, whereas we have seen nothing sub 35F since things thawed last Saturday. Russ S. hasn't hung any bags. Talked to Charlie W on friday. He said Peshtigo was at 1/3 crop, Tilleda worse than that. That's about all I know.
The Fat Lady some times misses her cue.... the frogs have never been off.

[maple connection]

Hey Doug,
It seems kind of weird sitting here with the windows open listening to those peepers that you are talking about. Poople fuzz flying around in March just seem kind of odd but, all in all the sap was dripping very little today with a very cloudy look. I am going to boil it down in the morning. I am trying to decide if I want to use the RO and be done in 45 minutes or make it 4 hours of a fun boil since there was not much time spent in front of the evaporator. I wish everyone the best.

[syrupkid]

I broke 1,000 gallons of sap toady.... out of 475 trees..... total for the season.... Sugar content is 1.75-1.9 out of a woods that does 3+ most years. Was up to Klebenow's on Thursday and he had 3,000 gallons of sap and was cooking, Melvin said it was the third time they had cooked. We have had freezing nights here when a lot of others havn't. Overall I'm considering myself pretty lucky compared to the others in the area. Tonight when I stepped out of the milking parlor all I could hear was frogs. Wierd season, thats for sure.

[PETE FELCH]

we are a little over .1 per tap . It was 78 here today and we got over a gal per tap ! Baffled????

[markcasper]

Glad to hear from you Pete! I had close to 2 gallons per tap from 4pm Sat. to 9pm Sunday.......tank running over. 1.7%. yes it is baffling figuring I'd only get a gallon a tap. 81 degrees sunday aft.

[maple connection]

Pete the fun is over for me, Time To go get the work truck and load up the tools. Going to Rochester for a week then Start maintance in Stevens Point. It won't be long and we will be cranking out asphalt for the start of another constuction season. I hope you guys can hang on up there alittle longer and make somemore syrup.

[Meridian Maples]

Throwing in the towel tonight. As of 5:00 the pumps are going off. Was a bummer of a season, but we did better then i thought, last couple of days it didn't run that bad. Season total of just over 700 gallons, was hoping to get 2000. I guess planning starts for next year.

[jfroe939]

For what it's worth, our boiled sap is starting to get the "buddy" smell. We're a little west of Shawano. Maybe some of you guys well north of 29 can luck out. Just kinda watch it so you don't throw in a bunch of buddy sap with your good, unfinished syrup still in the pan.

[jgotz]

well this season is over for me, 7 whole pints of syrup what a change from the 9.5 gallons of last year. the kids and i will just have to savor every drop. all we can do is hope for a better next year.

[PETE FELCH]

we are still going filled 4 barrels last nite . Very strong flavored lite color syrup. It filtered very hard ! All the syrup filtered hard this year as our sugar sand problems of before werent a problem